


The Mystic MCs

by Nitetime_Moon



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:02:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 33,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22122277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nitetime_Moon/pseuds/Nitetime_Moon
Summary: You all know the story of Mystic Messenger. Pick a member to date and change their lives, right? But what would happen if there were five main characters?Join Sydnee, Juliana, Moira, Kazumi, and Mi-na as they set off to heal the hearts of the members of a mysterious organization.
Relationships: 707 | Choi Luciel/Original Character(s), Han Jumin/Original Character(s), Kang Jaehee/Original Character(s), Kim Yoosung/Original Female Character(s), Zen | Ryu Hyun/Original Female Character(s)
Kudos: 13





	1. Prologue

~Prologue~

Starting a new game file...

LOADING

.

.

.

.

Ten minutes.

Nine. Eight. Mi-na checked her watch and let out a sigh. Still no sign of her friends.

She took another sip of her coffee.

_“Maybe they can’t come…”_

As she thought those words, a dark-skinned college student walked through the doors of the cafe and started to make her way towards Mi-na. Mi-na didn’t give the newcomer time to reach her table before she ran up to the brunette, engulfing her in a big hug.

“Kazumi! You’re here! I thought that no one would ever arrive!” Mi-na exclaimed as she hugged her tightly.

“Relax, it’s not even noon yet. Plus,” Kazumi motioned to the other people in the cafe, “everyone is staring at us.”

Indeed they were. Mi-na’s elated exclamations had shattered the peaceful air of the place, drawing the attention of the people there. Kazumi couldn’t care less about what others thought of her, but she knew her long-haired friend would feel uncomfortable under the attention.

Mi-na whispered a quiet oops, hid her eyes beneath her bangs, and led Kazumi back to the table she was sitting at. Moving her computer and coffee aside so that Kazumi could sit down, Mi-na asked her about her flight from Japan. 

“Not bad. I’m glad I’m not coming from somewhere as far as Scotland or Italy, like Liana and Yuni. My sleep schedule is already bad enough, even without jet lag.” Kazumi yawned, hand coming up to cover her mouth as if to emphasize her point.

Just then, as if Kazumi had summoned them by uttering their names, a red-haired woman and a pink-haired woman walked into the cafe and made their way towards the table. The pink-haired one let out a small yelp, and ran forward to collide with Mi-na, who was already standing up to greet them.

“MIIIIIIII-NAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! I FINALLY GET TO SEE YOU IN PERSON!!!!!” The woman was hugging her so tightly that Mi-na could barely breathe. But neither of them cared one bit.

“Yuni! I’m glad you got here safely! Was the flight super long?” Mi-na asked as they sat down. “And nice to meet you both in person!” Each one in their group of friends except for Kazumi and Mi-na had only talked to each other online before, so they were seeing each other in person for the first time.

“Nice to meet you Juliana.” Kazumi nodded at the red-head. Juliana nodded back, then turned to Yuni.

“Moira, you shouldn’t yell so loudly,” Juliana chided. “Everyone probably thinks you have no manners!”

“Well I don’t care!” Moira glared at Juliana with a pout on her lips. “And why don’t you call me Yuni?”

“I refuse to call you anything near your username, Yunikorn. Your given name is suitable enough for me.” Moira deepened her frown and was about to reply when a blonde young woman burst through the door in a hurry.

“Mi-na! Yuni! Liana! Kazi! Sorry I’m late!” As her voice echoed off the walls she ran up to the table that hosted the four women.

“SYDNEE!!! YOU’RE HERE! NOW WE ARE ALL HERE!!!” Moira yelled, making everyone in the cafe wince. She was just about to crush Sydnee in a hug when the cafe owner tapped her on the shoulder. 

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you all to leave.”

✧✧✧

“I can’t believe that we got kicked out of a cafe the first time we all meet in one place.” Sydnee chuckled and sat down next to Moira at the next cafe they went to. “You yelled loud enough to make half of the cafe deaf,” she teased, poking Moira’s arm.

“I’m sorry! I just get over excited sometimes!” Moira, realizing that she was getting loud again, lowered her voice before she continued. “But I’ll try not to get us kicked out again.”

“That would be preferable,” said Juliana as she sat next to Mi-na and Kazumi. “I’ve never been kicked out before and do not wish to repeat the experience.” She glared pointedly at Moira. Moira looked down at her hands. 

“It wasn’t just Moira’s fault. Sydnee also yelled when she came in,” Kazumi pointed out. 

“Hey!” Sydnee exclaimed, indignant.

“Let’s just drop the subject,” Mi-na proposed. “We don’t want to spoil our first meeting by fighting.” A few last glares were thrown around the group, but everyone agreed that this wasn’t the time to start a fight.

“How has college been for you, Kazi?” Sydnee asked, taking a sip of the coffee she had ordered.

“Same as always.” Kazumi attended SKY University, one of the most prestigious colleges in South Korea. “Most of school is boring except for my art classes though.”

“Didn’t you just come from Japan though? You posted in the group chat that you were flying back here from there.” asked Juliana.

“I went to take care of my mom for a bit. She got sick,” Kazumi answered. “Don’t worry though, she’s fine now!” Kazumi hurried to say after seeing the worried faces around her. “I wish I didn’t have to make up the work I missed though.”

“Ugh, I’m glad I don’t have to go to school anymore. The only school worth going to is a culinary school!” Moira said.

“At least I didn’t have to worry about work when I was in school. So far I haven’t been able to get any roles in acting here,” Sydnee complained. She frowned. “Could it be because I’m not charming enough?”

“You are overly charming, that’s the problem,” Juliana resorted. “Tone it down and people will want to work with you.”

“Now now, remember, no fighting,” Mi-na said, putting her hands up as Sydnee prepared some nasty responses to Juliana’s criticism. “I personally like school and work. I get to work on games with both!” Mi-na smiled, thinking of the many projects she had fun doing. “Speaking of games, I got this new dating game on my phone!” Mi-na pulled out her tan-colored phone and showed everyone the app. It had _RFA_ written across the shortcut in gold letters.

“A dating game? Aren’t those for lonely otakus or something like that?” Kazumi asked. She winced when she realized what she was accusing her friend of being. 

However, Mi-na and the others were used to her bluntness, so they ignored the rude undertone of the question. “Kinda, but they can also just be for fun! I mean, who wouldn’t want to be able to date the perfect guy?” Mi-na replied, tapping on the app to open it. 

Kazumi could think of plenty of people, herself included, that were fine without dating games. At any rate, she decided to keep her opinions to herself and concentrate on Mi-na’s phone.

The app opened with _RFA_ spilling across the whole screen. Just as the app finished loading, a bunch of green code fanned across the screen and a text from a person with the username Unknown popped up.

Mi-na was confused. This was supposed to be a dating game, right?

“I hate to break it to you, but this doesn’t look like a otome game, Mi-na,” Kazumi interrupted, looking at the screen.

“I agree. I haven’t played any otome games, but they usually don’t start off with people inquiring about lost phones,” Juliana commented.

Mi-na sighed. “Maybe I just got the wrong app on accident.” She looked back at the screen. Unknown was telling her that he couldn’t go to the address himself because he was currently overseas. They seemed to be implying that Mi-na go to the address instead.

“Definitely not an otome game,” Sydnee remarked.

“This whole situation seems kinda shady if you ask me,” Kazumi said, eyebrows furrowed. “Just delete the app already.”

“I agree with Kazumi. We don’t even know this person.” Juliana cautioned.

“But shouldn’t we at least see if we can help them?” Moira protested.

“We can at least hear them out first,” Mi-na proposed. Kazumi, Juliana, and Sydnee seemed to object to this, but she ignored them, turning back to her phone to type a reply.

Mi-na bit her lip. She did want to help, and the person didn’t seem to be up to anything...

“Religion my foot,” Kazumi muttered. Mi-na frowned at her. “What? It just sounds like an excuse to me.”

“You’re thinking of going, aren’t you?” Sydnee asked, pulling out her phone. “Well, tell me the address. I’ll call us a cab.”

“What? No, this is stupid. You can’t just trust some random stranger you met online!” Juliana exclaimed, twisting her mouth in the disbelief that her friends could be so stupid.

“But we should try to help them find the owner!” Moira grabbed onto Juliana’s arm. “Please Liana!” She begged.

“I agree with you Liana, but it looks like these three are going to go whether we like it or not.” Kazumi turned to Mi-na. “We should all download the app at least. So we can keep an eye on things.”

Mi-na nodded. The other four went to the app store to find the app. However, none of their searches provided them with the app. 

“I think the app isn’t on the app store anymore Mi-na,” Sydnee observed.

“Really? Hold on, I’ll put it on your phones manually.” They gave her their phones and within a few minutes all of them had the _RFA_ app. Once they had all joined, Mi-na looked back at her phone’s screen.

Sydnee put the address into her phone and proceeded to call a cab.

“This is not what I thought we would be doing today,” Kazumi commented. 

“Me neither,” Mi-na replied. 

✧✧✧

The address turned out to be an apartment complex. On the door of the apartment the group was looking for, there was a password lock on the door.

Sydnee knocked on the door. There was no answer. Moira tried next, knocking loud enough that the group received some glances from people walking down the hall. Still no answer.

Mi-na sighed. What had she gotten everyone into?

Ignoring the looks of discomfort from her friends, Mi-na put in the passcode Unknown gave her. The door let out a _click_ as it unlocked, and she and her friends reluctantly stepped inside.

“Hold on, I think I have something to write on.” Juliana began to go through her purse to find a piece of paper and a pen. “Get the contact information from Unknown so we can write it down and—”

“What the heck?!” Sydnee interrupted, startled. The messenger had thrust them all into a new chatroom, this time with a cloud background. Unlike the one they were in previously, this one had five other people in it, Unknown nowhere to be found.

The five women looked at each other in confusion. What was this? Who were these people?

“Uh oh. Something tells me being identified as a hacker is not a good thing with these people,” Sydnee pointed out.

The others looked at Mi-na, temporarily at a loss on what to do. Mi-na hurriedly typed a response into the chat room before the situation could worsen.

Zen posted a picture of a handsome red-eyed young man, presumably him in a selfie.

“Sydnee!” Both Juliana and Kazumi hissed. 

“What? One of them introduced themselves, so why can’t I?” Sydnee resorted.

“We still have no idea what this app is, or whose apartment we are even in!” Juliana reminded her. She kept herself from frowning too much to maintain a calm appearance, but her fingers running through her hair betrayed her distress.

Mi-na bit her lip. It was her fault that they were in the apartment in the first place. If she hadn’t insisted on helping that stranger... 

She was jolted out of her thoughts by Kazumi flicking her forehead. “What was done was done. Let’s just deal with the situation at hand,” She said to Mi-na. 

“You’re right,” sighed Mi-na. “Why don’t we sit down while we figure this out?”

“You can’t be serious.” Juliana’s already noticeable frown deepened.

“I call dibs on the bed!” Moira yelled as she took a running leap onto it, raising a huge cloud of dust. Mi-na flopped down next to her, and Sydnee chose to sit down on the remaining free space of the bed. Kazumi and Juliana shared a glance before giving defeated sighs and sitting down at the desk next to the bed.

All five of the women were starting to feel even more uncomfortable than they already were.

“Maybe we shouldn’t have made ourselves at home so quickly,” Moira conceded, feeling a bit embarrassed.

“This is why I sat in a chair,” muttered Kazumi.

“Well, we’re here now. As long as we don’t touch any other stuff in here, we should be fine,” Juliana declared. “Let’s just clear up whatever’s going on with this messenger and leave.” She met the eyes of each one of her friends and one by one they all nodded in agreement. Now that she had a grip on the situation, Juliana was feeling less distressed and could make sure everything went smoothly.

Turning their attention back to the messenger, they read V’s explanation of why no one went to the apartment.

The five friends looked up from their screens, half-dazed expressions on their faces. It had not even been 30 minutes, yet they were already members of a private organization they had never heard of before, sitting in the apartment of a deceased woman. 

“What a way to kick off our first time meeting in person, huh?” Sydnee remarked. Mi-na had to agree. Who knew that their cafe meeting would end up like this?


	2. Chapter 1

“So, uh, who’s gonna stay in the apartment?”

Sydnee glanced around the dusty space, asking the question everyone had been thinking. Sure, they had the _RFA_ information they needed on their phones. But they might still need something from the apartment. If one of them stayed there it would be less uncomfortable to step inside.

“I’ve already paid for the hotel Moira and I will stay at, so we must decline,” said Juliana.

Moira nodded reluctantly. “Yeah, otherwise I would definitely stay!”

“It’s a waste of money if I don’t actually stay in my dorm room,” Kazumi said.

“Well, Sydnee, if you, um, feel uncomfortable, I can stay here instead…” Mi-na suggested tentatively.

“Really? If you don’t mind that would be great.” Sydnee squeezed Mi-na’s hand and smiled, then gasped as she glanced at the clock on the bedside table. “Oh! There was an ad for auditions for a musical and they’re starting soon! I have to go! I’ll see you all later!” With that she was already out the door.

“I really don’t like the idea of you staying in this apartment, but at the same time it feels weird to just leave it alone.” Kazumi looked around warily. “Also, what will you tell your parents?”

“Um, I’ll just tell them that Sydnee needed me to split her rent until she got a job, so I decided to move in with her for a little while as well. For the experience of renting an apartment!”

“There’s no reason for you to lie to your parents, you know...” Juliana frowned. “Well, okay, telling them the truth would certainly worry them.” She abruptly got up from the chair at the desk, brushing the dust off of her skirt. “Moira and I should head back to the hotel to make sure our luggage has arrived safely. If you don’t need anything else from us…?”

“Don’t forget to set a date for us to meet up again while we are in South Korea!” Moira gave Kazumi and Mi-na a hug, then she and Juliana left for their hotel.

“I’ll stay and help you clean up this apartment a bit,” Kazumi said. “It’d make me feel a bit better about letting you stay here.”

“Don’t you have classes to attend? I don’t want you to interrupt your work for me.”

Kazumi shook her head. “Nah, I can just catch up on work later. Now hand me that duster.”

✧✧✧

The line for the auditions was surprisingly long. And full of women. 

Sydnee huffed as she surveyed the space they were waiting in. With all these people auditioning her chances of getting a part shrank.

“Why are all these people here?” Sydnee muttered to herself.

“You didn’t hear?” The woman in front of her turned around. “Rumor has it that the famous musical actor Zen will be starring in this musical!” A couple of women within hearing distance gave a little squeal at her words. “They tried to keep it a secret so that the auditions weren’t flooded with people, but,” she flung out her hand at the line and snorted, “you can see how well that worked.”

Sydnee’s eyes widened. First she joins the same organization a popular Korean actor is in, then she ends up auditioning to be in the same musical as him?

_All because of my amazing luck and general awesomeness, of course_. Sydnee smirked. Half of these people may just be Zen’s fans and have no acting skills whatsoever. She had this audition in the bag.

_If only the line would move a little faster._

✧✧✧

While Sydnee was waiting in audition lines, Moira was getting scolded by Juliana. Again.

“How do you pack almost every cooking appliance you own, but forget to bring clothes?!” Juliana rubbed her forehead. “You probably won’t even use all of these!”

“I might!” Moira protested. “Plus, I’m going to be baking for the RFA now!” She continued to pull out the many things that she somehow managed to get on the plane. 

“Moira. Do you really need, um, whatever this thing is?” Juliana pointed at one of the many items now laid out on the counter of the suite’s kitchen. 

“It’s a whisk. And yes, I use it to mix ingredients,” Moira huffed.

“Just— fine. It’s not as if I could just turn back time and force you to pack correctly. We’ll just go shopping later to correct your lack of clothing. And,” said Juliana, eyeing the cooking supplies, “another bag to fit all of that into.”

“Alright. I’m gonna go see what ingredients the grocery store has!” Moira quickly put her cooking appliances into the cabinets of the kitchen, then hurried out the door.

The hotel she and Juliana were staying at was beautiful. It even had a place to just pet cats! Apparently it was owned by a corporation named C&R or something, and someone working on the project wanted to make it a cat hotel. Juliana did not seem to care about the cats at all, but Moira loved having them around. To her they were the cutest creatures she had ever seen! Well, if only because unicorns didn’t exist.

The grocery store was only a few blocks away from the hotel, which was good since Moira planned to buy a whole bunch of ingredients. 

She was just coming out with two armfuls of bags when she ran smack dab into someone, knocking them over onto the sidewalk. \

“OMG I’M SO SORRY!” Moira gasped and almost spilled her groceries in her attempt to put them down and help the person up. It was a woman with short brown hair and tired brown eyes behind a pair of square framed glasses. The woman looked around as she dusted herself off and frowned as she saw the cup of spilled coffee on the ground. Moira spotted the coffee cup a second later and gasped again. “Was that yours?! Oh my gosh, I’m so so sorry! Don’t worry, I’ll buy you another!” Before the woman could say a word Moira gathered up her bags and started to tug the woman’s sleeve in the direction of a nearby cafe.

“There’s no need—“ the brunette tried to say, but Moira ignored her and dragged her into the cafe.

“I heard that the food and coffee was pretty good here! Order whatever you want and I’ll pay for it!” Moira smiled at the stranger and waved her towards the line. The woman, seeming to figure that Moira wouldn’t let her go until she had bought her another coffee, reluctantly got in line. Once she was done and Moira had paid, they exited the cafe. 

“Um, thank you for the coffee. I need to get back to work now.” The woman gave Moira an awkward nod, then turned around to head back the way she came. 

Moira’s smile brightened. She had gotten the ingredients she wanted from the store and bumped into someone cute today!

“Well, maybe I should refrain from physically bumping into anyone again.” She chuckled and began to make her way back to the hotel.

✧✧✧

Mi-na flopped onto the bed, sighing in relief. “That took soooooo long.”

Kazumi finished carefully wiping down the desk, then put the duster back where she found it. “Well, what did you expect? Only two people in the RFA even know where this place is.”

“Mm, true.” Mi-na sat back up and stretched. “Anyway, speaking of the RFA...,” she said, pulling out her phone, “I wonder what they’ve been up to.” Opening the _RFA_ chatroom, Mi-na saw that Yoosung and Seven were online.

Kazumi sat down next to Mi-na on the bed and glanced at the chat. “Ugh, why did you have to go and tell him that? I’m trying to go to sleep earlier, not later,” she said, rolling her eyes.

“Well, I was thinking that if you played a game instead of doing school work, you would be less stressed which would help you sleep.” Mi-na rubbed the nape of her neck. “Of course, if you don’t want to you don’t have to…”

Kazumi looked at her and sighed. “You do have a point. Sketching hasn’t been doing it for me lately.” Kazumi pulled out her phone, scrolling through her notifications. “I don’t think playing a game with a stranger will help, but I guess I can consider it.”

Mi-na smiled at Kazumi, then turned her attention back to the screen. 

Mi-na shot a pleading look in Kazumi’s direction as she spotted the “no” she was typing out. “You just said you would at least think it over, remember?”

Kazumi let out a heavy sigh but erased her flat out refusal, typing in a more noncommittal answer instead.

“Yoosung better not keep bugging me about LOLOL,” Kazumi huffed. 

“I’m sure he won’t. He seemed like a really nice person!” Mi-na said.

“Anyone can seem nice when you aren’t talking to them face to face.” Kazumi checked the time on her phone. Surprisingly it was only three in the afternoon. It felt like meeting up at the cafe, meeting the RFA, and cleaning the apartment took much longer than that.

“If I leave now I think I can make it to my last class,” Kazumi noted.

“I told you that you didn’t have to miss class for me!” Mi-na kicked Kazumi’s leg. “You should go now!”

“Relax, I didn’t miss too many classes. Plus,” she added, “Now that I’ve inspected the place I feel a bit better about you staying here.” Kazumi gave Mi-na a hug, then got off the bed and headed towards the door. “Call me if you need anything.”

“Alright. Bye!” Mi-na waved at her friend. As soon as Kazumi had gone, she cast a dejected look around the room. It was a lot quieter without anyone to talk to. She shook her head. “I’ll just think of it as the beginning of a new adventure, like in a game!” Swinging herself off of the bed, she began to head to her house to talk to her parents and collect her things.

✧✧✧

Juliana’s phone pinged as it received a message. Then it pinged again. And again. _Ping—_

She swiped her phone off of the desk in annoyance, turning off the sounds for the _RFA_ app. Before she put the phone down, her eye caught a piece of the conversation going on from the notifications. “Someone with pink hair and purple eyes…” That had to be Moira. Juliana sat down in a nearby chair as she opened the app to see what Moira had done this time.

Juliana slung her bag over her shoulder as she headed for the door and grabbed the writing pad provided by the hotel to keep track of how much she spent. “Huh. It’s a small world after all,” she murmured, glancing at the C&R logo. 

Moira was already outside her room with her arms now empty of grocery bags. “You know, you really don’t have to come with me just for clothes shopping,” Moira pointed out.

“I want to make sure you don’t get distracted and walk out with anything but clothing. And,” Juliana added as a bit of color rose to her cheeks, “I, um, seem to have forgotten a few things myself.”

“AHA! You made it seem like I was the only one who forgets things. But it wasn’t just me!” Moira started to skip down the hallway, her eyes sparkling with delight.

“Oh, whatever. Let’s just hurry so we can get back before dinner.”

✧✧✧

Sydnee’s stomach rumbled as she exited the building that held the auditions. Four hours. FOUR. She really didn’t expect so many people to come to one audition. There were still some in line. 

“Guess that’s what happens when you decided to hold open auditions.” Sydnee’s stomach growled again, this time louder, to remind her that all she had today was coffee and a muffin at the cafe. 

_ I should really get something to eat. I think I’ll just pick up some ramen at the convenience store. _

She pulled out her phone to get directions to the store nearest to her apartment. As she pulled up the GPS, an email came in informing her that she had gotten the part of the foreigner to voice in a game. Sydnee frowned at the screen. Though it worked as a good backup in case she didn’t get the part in the musical, she really hated doing foreigner roles. They usually portrayed the foreigner as stupid, which she hated. But, as an actual foreigner, they were the easiest roles for her to get. 

“I hope I get a role in the musical.” Sydnee went back to the GPS app, but was interrupted when her phone rang. Her eyes widened as she glanced at the caller’s name.

“Zen??? But— but how did he get my number?!” Confused but a little curious, Sydnee decided to answer. 

“Hello? Zen?”

“Hey, where are you?”

“Uh, why do you want to know?”

“What do you mean why do I want to know? Obviously I— Oh!” Zen paused for a minute as he realized something. “I’m so sorry! I was trying to call someone else, but I dialed the wrong number...”

“How did you even get my number?” Sydnee asked, popping in her earbuds so she could still hear him as she used her GPS. 

“Oh, Seven told me the numbers of all the new members earlier, so I saved them. I hope you don’t mind. All of the members have your number just in case.”

Sydnee chewed on her lip as she scanned the street for the convenience store. “Well, I mean, I don’t mind all that much. But Kazumi and Juliana might be a bit upset.” Finding the store, she began to make her way towards it.

“Oh, well then I guess I shouldn’t call them too often then, haha.”

“Nah, it’s fine. I’ll just let them know that the RFA members have our numbers.”

“Well, since we’re on the phone already, let’s talk. You mentioned that you were an actress, right? And you’re from America?”

“Yeah.” Sydnee entered the store, making her way to the aisle that held ramen. “I actually went to an audition today.”

“Really? For what?”

“Mmh, I think I’ll keep it a secret until I get the job!”

“Haha, ok, well I hope you get the part you want! Anyway, what made you want to come to South Korea for acting? I’m sure you would have an easier time getting a job in America.”

“Hmm.” Sydnee paused, trying to remember her reasoning as she grabbed a cup of ramen off of the shelf. “I think it’s because I want to stand out.”

“Stand out?”

“Yeah. There are plenty of people who look like me in America. If I do well here I’ll grab even more attention because I am a foreigner. I mean, I could have chosen plenty of other countries to stand out in, I guess. But some of my friends live here, so I’m more familiar with South Korea.”

“Hmm, that makes sense. I get noticed more because of my looks. But just remember, your acting is what truly matters!” Zen reminded.

Well, duh. “Ok, I won’t forget.” The small line at the cash register had cleared out, so she headed towards it as she said, “Ah, hold on for a minute, I have to buy something.”

After she had bought her ramen, she put her earbuds back in and started to search for the directions back to her apartment. “Okay, I’m back.”

“Cool. Anyway, were there any questions you had for me?”

“Well, why don’t you tell me more about the RFA members,” Sydnee said as she started down the sidewalk that would take her to her apartment building.

“Well, first there’s Yoosung. He’s completely addicted to this game called LOLOL, he’s the youngest out of all of us, and he’s in college.”

“And Seven? The one who gave you our numbers?”

“He’s practically an alien. He’s always so hyper. But he’s a really good hacker, or so I’ve heard.”

“Jaehee?”

“Jaehee’s a really hard-worker. She must have infinite amounts of patience to deal with Jumin.”

“Really? Tell me more about Jumin.”

“Ugh, him? He’s the CEO-in-line for this huge company, but he’s a jerk. So just ignore him, OK?”

Sydnee chuckled. “I’ll keep that in mind. But what kind of person do you think you are, Zen?”

“Well you must already know since you’re a fan of mine. I’m the perfect man. Handsome, can act, sing, and dance…”

“Well I better practice so I can be even more talented than you!” Sydnee teased. 

“Haha, you may be good, but I don’t think you’ll quite get to my level of perfection,” Zen laughed.

“We’ll just have to see.” Sydnee’s stomach grumbled for the third time that evening as she put her key into the lock on her door. “Well, it’s about time for me to eat dinner, so…”

“Oh, sorry to keep you.”

“Don’t worry about it.” She opened the door, stepping into her studio apartment and setting her bag down onto a table.

“You know, I called by accident, but the conversation wasn’t awkward at all. It’s not every day you find someone so easy to talk to. Maybe fate wanted us to meet.”

“Yeah, it was fun talking to you.”

“Let’s talk often, okay? If you want any advice on acting, singing, or dancing, call me anytime. Bye!”

“Alright, goodbye!”

Sydnee smiled as she hung up, putting her phone onto the table. She had already made herself an invaluable friend in the acting industry. Maybe it was fate, like Zen said.

“Well of course fate favors me. I’m just that cool.” Her stomach rumbled impatiently as she grabbed the ramen from her bag. “Right, less talk, more eating.”

✧✧✧

Kazumi glanced at the clock on the bedside table. It was almost midnight, and yet she was still not tired, despite having worked on her missed classwork for hours. And her first class was at 9AM. 

“I should’ve gotten those evening classes I promised myself instead of morning classes again.” Though Kazumi would get about 8 hours of sleep if she went to bed now, she knew that she would not be sleeping for at least another 2 hours. It would be a rough morning, as usual.

“Guess I’ll sketch some ideas out to pass the time.” Grabbing her sketchbook and her phone for finding inspirational pictures, Kazumi cleared away the numerous textbooks on her bed so she could sit on it. She cut on her phone only to be bombarded with all of the notifications she had received from the  _ RFA _ app over the day. There were messages from Juliana and Moira, Jumin Han and Jaehee Kang, and now Zen and Sydnee occupied the chatroom. Kazumi let out a laugh as she caught up on the story of Moira running into Jaehee and forcing Jaehee to let Moira buy her another coffee. That was Moira for you. 

Kazumi was just opening up Pinterest to find something inspiring, when she received a text from Yoosung.

“He really wasn’t kidding when he said he played that game so late, huh?” Kazumi shook her head. He was going to be very sleepy tomorrow if he had morning classes. Then again, who was she to judge, staying up for several hours into the night herself?

Staring at the blank sketchbook page before her, Kazumi once again went to open Pinterest. Once she got there, however, instead of looking up her usual photos for inspiration she began to look up LOLOL characters.

“Ugh, now he’s got that stupid game stuck in my brain.”  _ Still _ , she mused,  _ it’s pretty crazy that we go to the same school. _

She glanced at the search results from Pinterest. LOLOL, huh? Ah, well, she should practice drawing armor anyway. So Kazumi put her pencil to the paper and began to sketch.

✧✧✧

_ There weren’t supposed to be five of them.  _

_ Just one would have been enough. _

A lone, masked figure paced up and down the small alleyway. Every so often he would pass by a patch of moonlight and his hair would light up, shining bright white and pink in the gray-toned alley. 

“The Savior will be disappointed in me if I mess this up.” He kicked away an empty bottle of Coca-Cola, watching it bounce off of a wall. “There are too many outsiders, too many variables to control. Unless...” Suddenly his eyes lit up with the beginnings of an idea. He picked up the empty bottle and set it down beside two others in a line.

“There are five of them, one for almost every member in the RFA. If they form deep attachments with the members, I can lead one to Paradise...” The man flicked the first bottle, watching it tumble into the others and knock them all to the ground. “And the rest will follow.”

The man smirked under his mask as he exited the alleyway. “Maybe bringing in more people wasn’t such a mistake after all.” Now, all he needed to do was some planning.

After all, there were eleven new believers to prepare for.


	3. Chapter 2

Mi-na’s eyes snapped open. Breath coming in short gasps, she abruptly sat up and flailed for the light on her bedside table. However, she grasped only empty air and fell face-first into the floor, her forehead connecting with a thump. It was then when Mi-na remembered that she was in Rika’s apartment and not her parents’ house.

Reaching up to grab the edge of the bed, Mi-na felt her way around it until she reached the light switch. She sighed in relief at the lights that flickered on and sat back down onto the bed, rubbing the spot where her forehead had connected with the floor.

It was a strange dream that had jolted her from sleep. Maybe a nightmare, though Mi-na suspected that her panic upon waking up was caused by her new surroundings. There were two figures in her dream that she barely recognized as people. One had short blonde hair… Maybe Sydnee? And who was the other person? They had white hair, no pink, no…

Mi-na shook her head. She should just forget the dream and go back to sleep. Unfortunately, the shock of hitting her head on the floor ensured that she would not be falling back to sleep any time soon. A glance at the clock showed that it was almost 4 AM. Even Kazumi would’ve gone to sleep by now, so Mi-na couldn’t talk to her to pass the time.

Maybe she could do some work. But no, she was still too jittery from the dream to concentrate. And there wasn’t any game she could play that wouldn’t take up several hours of her sleep.

Sighing in defeat, Mi-na got up to get a glass of water from the kitchen. When she entered the kitchen, she noticed that her phone was on the counter. Perhaps she could explore the _RFA_ app a bit, and maybe even talk to a member if they were awake at this hour. Although, thinking on it further, it was unlikely that anyone was awake. Jumin didn’t seem to be the type to stay up this late, and Zen needed to rest to perform his best on stage. Yoosung would be finished playing LOLOL by now, and Jaehee… Well, if Jaehee was awake, which Mi-na hoped she was not, she would probably be busy working.

That left Seven. Mi-na didn’t know enough about him to make the assumption that he’d be up at this hour, but it was worth a shot.

Sure enough, when she turned on her phone and opened the _RFA_ app, Seven was online. Mi-na got back into the bed, hoping that talking to Seven would lull her back to sleep, and opened the chatroom.

Mi-na let out a yawn as she logged off of the app. It seemed that talking to Seven really did make her sleepy. She turned off her phone and set it on the bedside table. Mi-na reached for the light, but then hesitated before deciding to keep it on. It lit up the dark corners of the apartment and made her feel a little bit better.

Head falling back onto the pillow, Mi-na fell into a thankfully dreamless sleep.

✧✧✧

Kazumi slammed her hand down onto the clock that was cutting into her sleep with its alarm. Getting up in the morning was always a pain, but it was especially trying that morning since she had only fallen asleep around 3:45 AM. Kazumi rolled over and contemplated sleeping in instead of going to class before her guilt had her dragging herself out of bed.

Somehow she moved around her dorm, half asleep, to brush her teeth and get dressed. Her roommate was already gone, probably at work already. After she made sure that her bag contained what she needed for class, Kazumi moved towards the coffee maker set up on the counter.

As she made her coffee, she reached for her phone in her bag. The light from the screen might help wake her up. Plus, she wanted to see what her friends were up to, if any of them were awake yet.

Alerts from the _RFA_ app showed that Mi-na had been up at 4 AM, so she was probably still asleep. The other three didn’t have a reason to be awake at 8 AM either, so it was no surprise that they were offline. Kazumi was just about to go on YouTube to watch a speedpaint when she saw that Jaehee was online. She was a good person as any to talk to. Plus, Kazumi could ask Jaehee if the date of the RFA party had been set.

Kazumi swiftly glanced at the clock on her phone. She had been so immersed in the conversation that she had forgotten the time. Grabbing the rest of her coffee and her bag, she sprinted out the door.

Slipping her phone inside her pocket, Kazumi made it just as the class started. It was a good thing she did too, for there was a pop quiz waiting for her. Kazumi sighed. It was going to be a long day.

✧✧✧

Juliana looked up from her emails long enough to stretch. Though she was technically on vacation, it was hard not to respond to the questions the employees of T.S. Jewelry had asked. If she did not answer their questions, they might make a mistake somewhere, and then—

She shook her head, trying to wave away those thoughts. “I am here to see my friends and take a break, so I should do just that.” Everyone seemed to be frequenting the _RFA_ app since they joined yesterday, so Juliana checked there first. Unfortunately, no one but Zen was online. She moved to exit the app, but accidentally clicked on the open chatroom instead.

Juliana sighed. Well, she was in the chatroom now, so she might as well talk to Zen and ask about the RFA party they have to plan.

_Well, that wasn’t very fruitful at all_ , Juliana thought. _It would seem that the RFA is very lax when it comes to their parties._ “It’s just,” Juliana started as she saw the Barista Association’s email drop into her inbox, “who can plan a party and invite people without a party date?”

Juliana massaged her temple. If the members wouldn’t take any initiative, then she would. And she would do it while managing to spend time with her friends at the same time. Juliana exited the _RFA_ app and dialed a number. Mi-na picked up on the fourth ring.

“Mmh, Juliana?”

“Meet me at Temuki in thirty minutes. We are going to try different types of coffee.”

“What—?”

“See you there.”

Juliana felt a tiny bit of guilt as she hung up. Mi-na had been awake earlier that morning and was probably still half asleep. However, Juliana wanted to get something done while hanging out with the friends she had traveled to see. And Mi-na was the one who was the least likely to make her even more annoyed than she already was.

So she picked up a bag and a notepad and headed for Temuki.

✧✧✧

Mi-na’s eyes kept drooping downwards. She was still half asleep from waking up at 4 AM in the morning. But if Juliana wanted to meet with her…

Almost missing her stop after falling asleep on the bus, Mi-na finally made it to Temuki forty-five minutes after Juliana’s call. Temuki was Mi-na and Kazumi’s favorite cafe, though it wasn’t the cafe they had met up in with the other three the day before. Kazumi must have mentioned it, which would be why Juliana knew where it was.

As she entered the door, she spotted Juliana’s tell-tale wavy red hair in a booth. Green eyes glanced up as the bell on the door rang, and they narrowed in mild annoyance.

“You’re fifteen minutes late,” Juliana commented as Mi-na sat down across from her.

“Sorry. I was kinda sleepy and Rika’s place is kinda far from here.” Mi-na tilted her face downwards until her eyes were hidden by long brown bangs and studied an invisible spot on the table. Juliana always had been a bit forceful in the group chats, but in person she was downright intimidating.

“Don’t stare at the table,” Juliana snapped, then in a gentler tone said, “Even if you are apologizing, you need to seem more confident in yourself. Otherwise people will just walk all over you.”

“Um, alright.” Mi-na lifted her eyes to meet Juliana’s, receiving a small smile of approval in return.

“I apologize for my rudeness. I know you woke up in the middle of the night. But I wanted to do some research to help me answer this email for the RFA party while doing what I came to South Korea to do: hang out with my friends. And,” Juliana added, “you are someone I do not get the chance to speak to enough. So I decided to spend time with you today.”

“Oh! Really?” Mi-na blushed and swept her hair away from her eyes. “I’m glad you wanted my company.”

“Of course I do. We are friends, are we not? Now, give me some background information on coffee before I order.”

“I’m sure you can just ask the people at the counter.” Mi-na pointed to the lady sitting behind the cash register who was taking orders from customers.

“I could. But you are the one who drinks coffee almost as much as Kazumi does. So I figured I could get some information from you first.”

“Well…” Mi-na started to tell Juliana what she new about coffee, coffee beans, and brews of the top of her head. When she finished Juliana went to the counter and ordered them a few different types of coffee. They were going to be drinking a whole lot of caffeine. On the plus side, it would surely wake Mi-na up.

Juliana returned with the coffee and put three cups in front of Mi-na. “They are the three sweetest types, since I figured you don’t like bitter flavors.” She took out her notepad and began taking notes about the cups of coffee she had ordered for herself.

“So,” Juliana began conversationally, “how did your parents react to you ‘moving in with Sydnee’?”

“Oh, they were a bit skeptical, but agreed that I should learn how to take care of myself outside of home.” Mi-na took a sip of the first cup of coffee in front of her. It was mocha, Kazumi’s favorite. As she drank it, Mi-na wondered how long it took Kazumi to fall asleep the previous night.

“Makes sense. After all, the move was quite sudden.” Juliana scribbled down a few more coffee notes before moving on to her next cup of coffee. “Speaking of you temporarily moving out, how are you doing in Rika’s apartment? Was the reason you woke up at 4 AM related to being in a strange place?”

“Oh, that was just because of a weird dream. I don’t think it was because of the apartment though,” Mi-na hurriedly said, afraid Juliana was going to suggest that the apartment was haunted.

As if she could read her mind, Juliana said, “Don’t worry, I wasn’t going to suggest that the apartment is haunted. That’s more of a Sydnee thing to do. I just thought that maybe sleeping in an unfamiliar place made you nervous.”

“Maybe just a little,” Mi-na admitted, eyes disappearing back behind her bangs. “But I’ve gotten used to it now.”

“That’s good. If you still feel uncomfortable, you can make Sydnee spend the night. Teach her to think of someone other than herself.” Juliana rolled her eyes as she remembered how Sydnee rushed out of the apartment as soon as Mi-na agreed to stay.

“Sydnee does think about other people!” Mi-na protested. “Well, sometimes.”

“Sure she does.” Juliana finished her second cup of coffee and wrote down a few more notes. “I wonder why Kazumi suggested that Jaehee have the Barista Association contact me instead of you. I usually drink tea,” Juliana mused.

“Probably because she expected you to do what you are doing now: taking notes. You are really good at sending professional-sounding emails and would present one of our strengths to the RFA.”

“I suppose that’s true. You and Sydnee better not make me answer all of the emails, though.”

Mi-na chuckled. “I promise I’ll do my part. We’ll make sure Sydnee doesn’t get away with slacking off either.”

Juliana smiled. “Thanks for having coffee with me, Mi-na.”

“I should thank you! I’m wide awake now!” Indeed she was. Mi-na was ready to do a week’s worth of work when she returned to Rika’s apartment. Which she should probably do, considering she did not know what was in store for her now that she and her friends were apart of the RFA.

“Well, I’m glad you’re awake. Though, next time all five of us should meet up.”

“I can check in with Kazumi and Sydnee to see when they are free. After all, you and Moira are only here for a month, right?”

“Yes. It’s not very long, but work beckons.” Juliana sighed.

“Well, enough about work for now.” Mi-na laughed and said, “I want to know how Moira ended up meeting an RFA member yesterday.”

✧✧✧

Sydnee was wearing a hole in the floor with the amount of pacing she was doing. She had already auditioned for whatever roles she could find, so until they got back to her she had a lot of free time on her hands.

“I suppose I could call up everyone to hang out now that Yuni and Liana are in South Korea.” Sydnee reached for her phone, but then remembered that Kazumi was in class and that Mi-na was probably still asleep. That left Moira and Juliana, which was a bad combination if you were feeling anxious. Juliana would have nothing but harsh words for her, and Moira would be too hyper for Sydnee to deal with.

Sydnee flopped onto her bed, phone still in hand. She could call everyone to hang out after Kazumi got out of her classes, but that was still in a few hours. That just left practicing for a performance… 

_There is no reason to be nervous. I killed that audition!_ Still, there were a lot of other good contestants… And the chance to work with someone as famous as Zen so early in her career… 

A distraction. She needed a distraction. And Sydnee knew just where to find one.

Sydnee logged into the _RFA_ app and almost dropped her phone in shock as she found V online.

Sydnee exited the RFA app and checked for any calls or emails about the audition, but unsurprisingly found none. However, unlike earlier she was now in the mood to practice instead of loafing about until she got an answer. So Sydnee stood and began to warm up her voice.

✧✧✧

_Going to Temuki with Mi-na. Will be back for dinner. -Juliana_

Moira frowned at the note on the desk. Juliana went off to have fun and left her at the hotel by herself! She could work on those recipes for the RFA party, but right now she was in the mood to talk to someone. So Moira started her search for a conversation partner by turning on her phone. 

It was no surprise that she went straight to the RFA app. Even if there was no one to talk to, reading the previous chatrooms was entertaining. It was slowly become addictive, like it was a video game or something. Luckily for her, a chatroom with Seven inside of it was already open.

Moira looked at the clock in her room. Juliana should be back for dinner soon, if she wasn’t too full from whatever she had at the cafe. _Too bad she didn’t invite all of us. We came here to spend time with them after all…_

Suddenly an idea popped in her head. Kazumi shouldn’t have too many classes tomorrow and Sydnee didn’t have a job yet. As long as she checked in with Mi-na, she could get them all together to spend a day doing whatever. A big grin spread across Moira’s face.

Finally, her vacation with her friends could truly begin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With this update, I've finally caught up to the chapter I am working on! Expect the next update in February!


	4. Chapter 3

As soon as she woke up to her alarm, Moira’s phone found it’s way into her hand. Immediately, she sent a text to the group chat everyone had been active in before joining the RFA. It read: _Clear out your schedules and meet me at Temuki at 11 AM._ She didn’t mention why she wanted them to meet up, so hopefully they would assume that it was some kind of emergency and be on time.

Moira bounced around her hotel room in excitement as she got ready for the day. The plan was sure to succeed. Her friends should be free today, so they could finally hang out all together! Oh, there were so many things that Moira wanted to do with them. But first...

She had made a list of a few things to bake to sell at the RFA party, but Moira wanted to make sure that she could first of all, bake them in a timely fashion, and second of all, that they would taste good, of course. The first thing to test were the different types of cookies. Moira went to the kitchen area of her suite and started laying out her ingredients. As she laid them out, Moira realized that she was short on butter. She must have forgotten to look for more butter after meeting Jaehee, and she didn’t notice yesterday because she was feeling too lazy to bother baking. Oh well. Time to go shopping again. 

Moira wrote down the type of butter she wanted and headed out to finish her shopping. On the way to the store, she stopped by a cafe for some coffee. Usually getting up at 7 AM or earlier wouldn’t be a problem for Moira, but she was still a bit jet-lagged from the change in time zones from Italy to South Korea.

 _I’ll only get a small cup though,_ she thought as she entered the cafe. _I don’t wanna be so full that I can’t order anything from Temuki later._ Moira ordered and then went to the side counter to put sugar and cream into her coffee. 

“That is a lot of cream,” a female voice said from behind Moira as she dumped her 4th packet of cream into her coffee.

Nearly spilling her cup from her jerk of surprise, Moira wheeled around to see the woman she had just met two days ago, Jaehee Kang!

“OMG, Jaehee?! Wait, am I supposed to call you Ms. Kang? Sorry, I don’t know Korean formalities very well.” Moira’s words came out in a jumbled blur from her excitement. She was hoping to have the chance to talk to Jaehee in person again. 

“It’s alright. You may call me Jaehee.” Jaehee gave Moira a nod in greeting, which Moira quickly returned. “I don’t think we got to properly meet each other last time, so it’s nice to meet you.”

“Yes, nice to meet you too!” Moira started to extend her hand for a handshake, then retracted it quickly when she remembered that handshakes were not as common in South Korea. “Um, sorry about when I bumped into you. Juliana said it was rude of me to drag you to a cafe like that.”

“Ah, let’s just put that behind us.” 

“Oh, really? Cool!” Moira smiled. Maybe she could still make friends with Jaehee! “I’m surprised to see you here. I thought you’d be working, since that’s what you always seem to be doing.”

“Well, I wanted a change from the coffee at work this morning.” Jaehee smiled sheepishly as she lifted the coffee in her hand. 

“Well, I’m glad you did!” Moira turned back to the side counter to finish mixing the cream and sugar in her coffee. Finishing that, she grabbed a lid and a straw and put them on the cup. “I’m still a bit jet-lagged, so I stopped by to get something to wake me up.”

“Was it really that bitter that you needed so much cream?” Jaehee pointed to the empty cream containers still on the counter.

Moira blushed. “I, well, I just really like sweet flavors.”

“You should try taking it black sometime. It will completely change your perspective on coffee.”

Moira stuck out her tongue. “Bleh, black coffee sounds disgusting. I’ll take sugar and cream any day!”

“It was just a suggestion.” Jaehee checked the time on her watch. “Anyway, I should get back to work now. I still have piles of work sitting on my desk.”

“Oh, what direction are you headed? If we’re headed in the same direction we can talk a little while longer!”

“Well…” Jaehee gave Moira a sidelong glance. “You could probably find the building with a search, but I’d still rather you not learn how to get to my workplace by following me.”

“Oh. You still think I’m suspicious.” Moira shoulders drooped. 

“Don’t take it personally. I just know next to nothing about you.”

“Yeah, I understand that. But I mean,” Moira went on, “Seven has my background information, and I’m sure if I were dangerous you could always just ask Jumin to get rid of me, right?”

Jaehee covered her mouth, trying to stifle her laughter. “You make it sound like Mr. Han’s a mafia boss.”

“Ooh, wouldn’t that be a plot twist! But I promise I’m going to the store down the street, the one over there.” Mi-na pointed across the intersection in front of the cafe to the street heading right. “If you’re headed in that direction and I follow you past the store you have my full permission to act like I’m trying to rob you and call the police.”

“No, no need to do all that.” Jaehee waved her hands in front of her. “I am headed in that direction. You can walk with me until you get to the store if you wish.”

“Yippee!” Moira bounced up on her toes. “Then let’s go! You don’t wanna be late for work!”

“No, wouldn’t want that…”

The two women exited the cafe and crossed the intersection. Jaehee took a sip of her coffee and glanced at Moira again. “So, what do you think of the RFA so far?” she asked.

“Hm, the RFA?” Moira looked out at the busy street. “It’s so lively! I mean, there isn’t any information on the party so far, but all of the members are so fun to talk to!” She smiled at Jaehee. “Especially you!”

Jaehee quickly looked away, her face flushed. “I-I’m happy to hear that. It’s nice having other women in the RFA.”

“Oh yeah, the women outnumber the men now, huh?” Moira giggled. “Maybe we should hold a boys vs girls competition sometime!”

“What would the competition be about?”

Moira shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. It’ll be fun to just get together and hang out.”

Jaehee frowned. “I doubt any of us have enough free time to do that. At least, I sure don’t.”

“Really? Do you ever get a break, or a vacation, or something?”

“No, not really. I have a good paying job, so I should work to keep it, you know?” Jaehee frowned slightly as she took another sip of her coffee.

“I think you work too much! Jumin makes you work overtime too, doesn’t he!” Moira tried to cross her arms, but found that it was too difficult while holding her coffee cup, and gave up.

“Well, he pays me for all of my overtime hours.”

“That’s not the point! You need—” Moira stopped when she realized that they were in front of the store she had promised to stop walking with Jaehee at. She sighed as she wanted to talk with Jaehee a little longer. “Just make sure to take breaks and get more sleep, OK?”

“Oh don’t worry about me. I watch recordings of Zen’s musicals every so often. That’s all the break I need.” Jaehee smiled. “It wasn’t so bad to get to talk to you.”

Moira bounced on her toes, pleased to hear that Jaehee enjoyed her company. “I’m glad! We need to talk more! If not in person at least in the chatroom!”

“I’ll be sure to make time in my schedule.” Jaehee waved as she continued down the sidewalk, and said, “Goodbye, Moira.”

Moira looked after her until she was hidden by the other people on the sidewalk. Seeing her work so hard made Moira want to help her catch a break. Maybe next time she got everyone together she could invite Jaehee too. 

Well, anyway, it was time to do what she had planned that morning. Buy the ingredients, bake sweets, and then go to meet her friends at Temuki!

✧✧✧

Mi-na was greeted with an unusual sight when she checked the apartment’s mailbox that morning. Honey Buddha Chips and PhD. Pepper were sitting in it, waiting to be consumed. Seven did say he would send them to her, Mi-na supposed.

She went back to the apartment and set them on the table. Checking the time on her phone, Mi-na saw that it was 8 AM. She had time before heading to Temuki. It couldn’t hurt to try them...

As soon as she put a chip in her mouth, Mi-na knew that would be her breakfast for the day. The sweet and salty taste of the chips was delicious, and the PhD. Pepper helped wash it all down. Before she knew it she had eaten the whole bag and drained the PhD. Pepper bottle of its contents. It was a horrible, unhealthy choice for breakfast, really. But Mi-na supposed she could let it slide for that morning.

Opening up the RFA app, Mi-na sent Seven a text.

Mi-na smiled. Seven was always so lively. She hoped that she would get to talk to him in person sometime. Oh well, for now she should stop procrastinating on her work and actually do it before she goes to Temuki.

However, just as she was about to pull out her laptop to work, the RFA app started to send notifications from a new chatroom. Unable to stop herself, Mi-na opened the chatroom to see what was going on.

Mi-na sighed. Hopefully Zen really would be fine. But she did really want to see pictures of Jumin’s cat…

“Ack, I need to do my work!” She pulled out her laptop and turned it on, finally ready to get to work. Turning off her phone to limit distractions, Mi-na started her work.

✧✧✧

Juliana’s phone was ringing. She paused in the middle of getting ready to see who it was. Surprisingly, it was Jumin Han.

“Why would he be calling me?” Juliana had no wish to speak to him, but she answered nevertheless. After all, it could be some kind of emergency.

“Hello?”

“Assistant Kang, I need you to—”

“This isn’t Assistant Kang,” Juliana cut him off, a bit more abruptly than she meant to, but she hated it when people wasted her time. “This is Juliana Tessaro.”

“Oh, I must have dialed the wrong number.”

“Indeed. Was there anything you needed Mr. Han?”

“Mr. Han is my father. Call me Jumin instead,” Jumin said, sounding a tad annoyed. “Speaking of names, I think that was the first time I’ve heard you say your full name.”

Juliana frowned. Was he going to try to find more information on her using her name? “So? What of it?”

“You and Kazumi were more reserved when giving introductions.”

“I didn’t notice you introducing yourself.”

“I never said the caution was a bad thing. I would just like to know a bit more about our new members since Seven refuses to tell us anything. But you rarely use the chatrooms to talk about yourself.”

Hm. He sure was perceptive. “Well, right now you have my full attention. If you have the time, ask me a few questions.” Juliana figured that he was busy since he was trying to call Jaehee, so he wouldn’t have the time to ask her any questions. She was wrong.

“Very well then,” he said. “What’s your occupation?”

Of course he would start with that. Juliana stifled a sigh. She wasn’t trying to hide it exactly, she just didn’t want to be plagued with questions or business meetings during her vacation. Nevertheless, she already said that she would answer his questions. “I am the CEO of T.S. Jewelry.”

“T.S. Jewelry? I haven’t heard that name before.”

“It’s based in Italy.”

“That’s pretty far from here. What brings you to South Korea?”

“Well, I wanted to visit Mi-na, and everyone else tagged along, turning it into a vacation.”

“Hm.” Jumin paused for a moment. Juliana was just about to ask him a question when he asked, “How do you like the cat hotel?”

“The cat hotel?” For a moment Juliana had forgotten that Moira had told him and Jaehee where they were staying. “Oh, it’s a fine hotel. I’m sure it was a risky decision considering how many people are allergic to cats, but the hotel seems to be doing just fine.”

“Do you not like cats?”

“I mean, I don’t adore them I suppose.”

“Hmf. I suppose I’ll have to send you pictures of Elizabeth the 3rd as well. Then you’ll see what you’ve been missing out on.”

What was with this guy and cats? If she was being honest with herself, he seemed a little obsessed with them. “I suppose you can do that?”

“I’ll add you to the list along with Mi-na and Zen.” Jumin paused as a voice called him in the background of the call. “Well, those were most of the questions I wanted to ask you. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me.”

“That was it? Just my job and cats?”

“That was all, although I’m a bit surprised you did not bring up your company yourself and propose a business deal.”

“I’m on vacation, not at work,” Juliana said, voice straining a bit with irritation.

“My apologies. Anyway, I must get going.”

“Yes, I’m sure you need to get back to work. I suppose we can talk more in the chatroom if need be.”

“Yes, we’ll do that. Goodbye Juliana.”

“Goodbye Jumin.”

As Juliana hung up, she remembered that she could have asked Jumin about the party. “Ugh, I got sidetracked by his cat related questions.” She frowned at her phone. Would he really just send her pictures of his cat? Well, whatever, it didn’t matter right now. If she didn’t finish getting ready she’d be late to Temuki.

She could focus on the RFA later.

✧✧✧

“I’ve **got** to go to sleep earlier,” Kazumi moaned as she dragged herself out of bed. She would’ve slept in if it hadn’t been for Moira’s 15+ text messages waking her up. It wasn’t as if she had classes to go to.

Kazumi picked up her phone and checked the messages. Other than the private messages from Moira telling her to wake up, there was a message in the group chat telling everyone to meet at Temuki at 11 AM. Kazumi glanced at her clock and let out an exclamation. It was already 10:30!

Immediately Kazumi scrambled to get ready, pulling on some jeans and a hoodie, and stuffing her feet into a pair of converse highs. She quickly washed up in the bathroom, then ran out of her dorm to grab a quick breakfast.

Kazumi texted Moira, telling her that she was going to be late as she jogged to the cafeteria. She looked up from her phone and then— BAM! Her phone and a bunch of books went flying.

“Oh! Oh my gosh I’m so sorry!” Another student bent down in front of her to grab her phone and his books. Luckily everything had fallen into the grass, so it didn’t look like anything was damaged. Kazumi knelt to help him pick everything up. 

“Don’t apologize, I should have been watching where I was going,” she said as they gathered the last of the books.

“Heh, I wasn’t watching where I was going either.” The student picked up the last of the books and put them back into a stack. “Thanks for helping me pick these up.”

“You’re welc—” The words died on Kazumi’s lips as he looked up. He had enormous purple eyes. They were unusual, but quite pretty. And maybe a bit familiar?

“Um, do I know you from somewhere?” Kazumi blurted out the words before she could stop herself.

“Um, I don’t remember seeing you before.” The young man scratched his head. “My name is Yoosung Kim, if that helps you remember.”

Yoosung Kim! That’s why he seemed familiar. He was the college student in the RFA, the one who’d asked her to play LOLOL with him. What were the odds that they’d literally run into each other?

“Oh, we have met then. Well, not in person.” Kazumi winced. It was the first RFA member she met and of course it had to be when her hair was sticking up from a serious case of bedhead. “Uh, I’m one of the new members of the RFA, Kazumi.”

Yoosung nearly dropped his books again from shock. “OMG, really?! I know you said we went to the same university, but I never thought that I’d actually run into you.” Yoosung chuckled. “Quite literally too, I guess.”

“Heh.” Kazumi gave a short laugh before realizing that they were still standing in the middle of the sidewalk, blocking traffic. “Uh, so, where were you headed?” she asked, stepping onto the grass beside the sidewalk.

Yoosung noticed the people trying to walk around them and also stepped onto the grass. “I was just going to the library to return these books. I haven’t been reading them, so I figured someone else could use them.”

Kazumi leaned over to look at the books. She recognized one of them as a book she had to read for a geography class. “Won’t you need this for class?”

Yoosung glanced away and shrugged. “I’m sure I can just look up stuff online.”

“Yeah, until you’re required to read it in class,” Kazumi retorted, folding her arms. “You should keep the books just in case.”

Yoosung sighed. “OK, OK, I’ll take them back to my dorm room.” He looked up at the sky. “I wonder if Rika would be mad at me for slacking off like this?” he murmured, half to himself.

Kazumi shifted on her feet, feeling uncomfortable. She didn’t know exactly how Rika passed away, and she wasn’t very good with condolences anyway. To make matters worse, her stomach growled. 

“Oh, sorry, I’ve kept you from what you were doing,” Yoosung said, looking back at her.

“Ah, it’s fine, I’m just headed to the cafeteria. I guess I’ll see you around?” she said, moving to walk past him.

“Ah, wait!” Yoosung called after her. “This might sound weird but... Do you mind if I join you?” he asked.

“We still barely know each other. Besides,” Kazumi said, motioning to the books in Yoosung’s arms, “Weren’t you taking those back to your dorm?”

Looking a little dejected, Yoosung looked at his feet. “Sorry. I just wanted to keep talking to you.”

Kazumi internally facepalmed. She really needed to learn a better way to word things. “Maybe we can talk a little later,” she said, trying to make up for her blunt words. “Maybe while we play that game? LOLOL?”

He instantly brightened at the mention of the game. “Yes! That one! Call me if you do want to play it!”

“OK. See you later.”

As she walked away, Kazumi contemplated whether she should have accepted his invitation to play the game. It could get annoying if he expected her to play every night. Then again, it couldn’t hurt to play to see if it would help her to go to sleep earlier.

She opened her phone to put in the reminder to call him, but almost dropped for the second time that day when she saw it was 10:55 AM.

Kazumi was going to be very late.

✧✧✧

_It’ll be fine. They’ll understand,_ Sydnee thought as she sprinted into Temuki. Unfortunately, not only was Juliana glaring at her with impatience, but Moira too!

“What? Why are you all staring at me? I know I look great today but...” She paused when the other four didn’t respond to her joke. Sydnee glanced at the clock and turned back towards the group. “It’s only 11:20. I’m only 20 minutes late!”

“Only? _Only_ 20 minutes late?” Juliana snorted. “I know you’re pretty self-centered, but I thought you would at least want to spend time with us.”

“Hey, I—”

“Even Kazumi was only ten minutes late,” Juliana said, cutting her off.

“Hey, I already apologized for that.” Kazumi frowned at Juliana.

“Um, guys, can we maybe—”

Mi-na was cut off by Moira clapping her hands together to get their attention. “Whatever, I’m just happy that you all came. Let’s just forget about who was late or on time or whatever. Okay?”

Juliana sighed. “My apologies Sydnee, Kazumi. I just get a little annoyed when I feel that my time is being wasted.”

Sydnee laughed and took the seat next to Mi-na. “Oh, believe me, we know.”

Juliana frowned at her, but then her mouth turned upwards in amusement.

“By the way,” Sydnee continued, “I feel like I haven’t spoken to any of you since we joined the RFA.”

“And who’s fault is that?” Kazumi muttered, flipping through the pages of the Temuki menu.

“Ugh, why is everyone so salty today?!!” Sydnee threw her hands up in frustration. “Just tell me what you’ve been doing.”

“Oooh, ooh, I’ll go first.” Moira waved her hand around in the air. “You know that RFA member who’s coffee I spilled? Jaehee? I met her again today and I got to talk to her!”

“Oh yeah, I forgot you’ve met an RFA member in person too…” Kazumi said.

“Wait, you’ve met an RFA member?!” Mi-na exclaimed.

“Yeah, not even an hour ago. It was Yoosung, the college student.”

“Oh, you guys go to the same university? That’s so cool!” Sydnee smiled at Kazumi. “I’m kinda jealous. I wanna meet a RFA member in person too!”

“I mean, it was kinda awkward, since literally ran into him,” Kazumi said.

“OMG, I literally ran into Jaehe! High five for being anime cliches!” Moira put her hand up for the high five, but Kazumi pointedly ignored her. She put her hand back down, looking disappointed.

“Well, I’ve just been waiting to get more info on this party,” Juliana said.

“I talked to V yesterday, but he said he needs more time to decide on the date,” Sydnee replied.

“Um, well, staying in Rika’s apartment hasn’t been so bad,” Mi-na added.

“Oh yes, I meant to suggest that you stay over there for at least a night, Sydnee,” Juliana remarked.

“I mean, if you really want me to, Mi-na, I can, but...” Sydnee paused to take a breath. This was the moment she had been waiting for, the reason why she was late to the meeting! “I got a callback!”

Four pairs of eyes blinked at her in confusion.

“A callback?”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“What did you get called back for?”

“Is that why you were late?”

Sydnee slapped a hand to her forehead. Did they really not know what a callback meant for her? “I got a callback from the place I auditioned at two days ago! You know, when I left the apartment quickly ‘cause I didn’t want to miss it?”

“Ohhhhhhhh.” Kazumi rubbed her eyes, exhausted from staying up late. “Sorry, I should have known what you meant. Congratulations Sydnee.”

“Yeah, I’m so proud of you!” Moira jumped up and gave Sydnee a hug before sitting back down. Juliana and Mi-na echoed the congratulations of the other two.

Sydnee blushed. “Thanks guys. That’s actually the reason why I was late. And,” Sydnee added before Juliana could open her mouth, “I didn’t call to say that I was going to be late because I only saw the callback email this morning and had to rush to get there.”

“Well, if it means you’re finally getting a job, I guess I can’t complain.” Juliana looked at Moira. “Now, what is it that you brought us here for in the first place?”

“Well obviously so that we could hang out.” Moira rolled her eyes in an exaggerated fashion, then stood up. “C’mon, let’s go do something fun!”

“Hey, I haven’t even gotten to order coffee yet!” Kazumi protested.

“Well then hurry up!” Sydnee jumped up to stand beside Moira. “We can go watch some movies or go to an arcade or something! Then we can eat dinner! My treat!”

“With what money?” Juliana asked, raising an eyebrow. Despite her skepticism, she stood up and started to gather her things.

“Fine, then Juliana can pay.” Sydnee stuck out her tongue at the redhead who, surprisingly, made a face back at her.

“Oooh, and we can try out recipes for the RFA bake sale!” Moira was practically bouncing out of the door.

“I wanted to run some game ideas by you all too,” Mi-na said as she too stood up.

Kazumi looked at the menu one last time and sighed. Getting up out of her seat, she said, “Alright. Give me a second to buy some coffee first.”

Sydnee beamed at Moira. It may seem so easy to get them all together to hang out, but with the whole RFA incident, none of them took the initiative to do so except for Moira. Oh well, they were together now, and a day of fun activities awaited them!!!

✧✧✧

✧✧✧

“Moira? This is Jaehee. Looks like your phone isn’t on.”

A short pause ensued, then “I wanted to ask if you’ve seen any of Zen’s musicals before. If not, you definitely should! They are so full of life, and Zen pretty much becomes the character he’s playing. I think you’d enjoy a few of them. Um, I could send you the titles if you want.”

From the background came an, “Assistant Kang.”

“I’ll be right there Mr. Han. Sorry, I have to get back to work now. Hopefully I’ll get to talk to you again soon.”

“Goodbye.”

✧✧✧

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look! I actually kept to my update schedule!
> 
> Readers: Yeah just barely.
> 
> -_-
> 
> Anyway, thank you all for reading! The next chapter will be updated early April!


	5. Chapter 4

Juliana woke up feeling stiff all over. This definitely because of the fact that she slept on the hard floor of Rika’s apartment. After spending the day with her friends, they headed back to Rika’s apartment to take a look at Mi-na’s game concepts. Sydnee offered to sleepover at the apartment with Mi-na, Moira wanted to join, and suddenly they were all sleeping over. After drawing straws, Kazumi and Mi-na got to sleep on the bed while Juliana had to share the floor with Moira and Sydnee.

Juliana sighed as she rubbed her neck. If only she had gotten to sleep on the bed. Then she wouldn’t have had to suffer through Moira’s tossing and turning all night. Even when asleep she still seemed to have endless amounts of energy.

Standing up carefully so as to not wake her still sleeping friends, Juliana made her way into the bathroom. A quick glance into the mirror confirmed what she had already suspected. Her hair was a mess of curls sticking up every which way, and dark circles lined her eyes as a testament to her sleepless night. Fixing all of this was going to be such a hassle.

Nearly forty-five minutes of frustration later, Juliana walked out of the bathroom, her red curls having been wrested into a bun. She stepped over Sydnee and Moira to plop down at the desk near the bed. The desk was a mess of papers for all sorts of RFA party related things. Guest information, party venues, you name it. Nothing too interesting to catch her eye. That is, until she saw a piece of paper with a strange design sketched onto it sticking out of a drawer. Mindful of V’s warning of an alarm, Juliana carefully pulled the paper out of the drawer to get a closer look at it. The design was a strange eye-like shape with the words “Mint Eye” on top of the drawing. Perhaps it was a logo for another organization Rika was creating?

Wanting to know more, she fished out her phone from her belongings and navigated her way to the RFA app. One of the members might know something about the logo. Though, since they weren't supposed to touch anything on the desk, she couldn’t let on where she had gotten it from.

As soon as she logged into the app, it was flooded with notifications from chatrooms that she had missed. The RFA members sure did chat a lot. There was a chatroom where Seven was talking to Yoosung about some “Honey Buddha Chips”, one filled with Zen’s selfies, and one with… V?! He had gone online! And he had said something about the party!

Her fingers moved swiftly, hoping to finally receive the date so that they could plan for the party in earnest, but she soon pursed her lips in disappointment as she saw that he had left before giving them a date. Oh well, at least he had promised to give them the date later on today.

“Speaking of the party…” Juliana muttered to herself. The Barista Association had gotten back to her with more questions. So far they were the only guest invited to the party that still had no date. Despite her irritation, Juliana was determined to get them to attend the party. 

The notifications of the previous chatrooms cleared just as a new chatroom was opened, this time with Jaehee in it. Juliana clicked on it, hoping that she could get some answers about the strange logo.

Ah! Right, she forgot to ask about the Mint Eye drawing! Juliana sighed as her shoulders drooped in disappointment. Hopefully she’d get a chance to ask later.

A yawn had her looking up from her phone to see Moira stretching as she got up.

“What a great night’s sleep!” she exclaimed, rising from the floor. 

Sydnee, the last one still in the makeshift bed on the floor, groaned and rolled over, stuffing her head under a pillow. “It’s too early for you to be this loud.”

Juliana rolled her eyes, but her mouth quirked up in amusement. “I don’t know how you two could even sleep on that floor,” she said, resting her head in a hand.

“Easy, silly. You just close your eyes, and them BAM— Sleep!” Moira flung herself back down onto the makeshift bed to emphasize her point. Sydnee groaned again, and Moira winced. “Sorry Sydnee!”

By this point Moira had woken up Mi-na and Kazumi as well, the latter of the two sitting up and glaring at them.

“Darn it Moira, I almost got a decent amount of sleep for once,” Kazumi grumbled.

“Just go back to sleep then,” Mi-na said, rolling back over to do just that.

None of them would ever get anymore sleep if Moira didn’t have something to do soon, so Juliana got up and told her, “Come on Moira, let’s get dressed and go buy some breakfast for everyone.”

“Oooh! I can make pancakes!” Moira hopped off of the floor and made her way to the bathroom. “I’ll be ready in about 10 minutes!”

Good. The other three might be able to sleep a little longer then. “I’ll keep her out shopping for a bit, so you all get some more sleep, OK?”

Kazumi gave her a thumbs up from the bed and turned back over. Sydnee was already fast asleep, if the soft snores coming from her pillow were anything to go by, and Mi-na seemed to have fallen back asleep as well.

Juliana met Moira outside of the apartment after they were ready, with a notepad and pen in hand.

“Pancake shopping time!~” Moira said, before she took off towards the elevator, Juliana running to keep up. 

Hopefully she really could buy her friends some time to sleep.

✧✧✧

Unfortunately, one in particular didn’t get to fall back to sleep for long.

Sydnee groaned as the noise from her ringing phone woke her up again. Well, more precisely, the pillow Kazumi threw at her head after the first two rings woke her up.

“Turn it off! I can’t sleep with your phone ringing in my ear!” Kazumi grumbled at her.

“Sorry…” Sydnee apologized. She rolled on her back and brought the phone up to her face so she could see who was calling so early in the morning. It was… Zen?! Startled out of her grogginess, Sydnee quickly answered the phone. “Hello, Zen?”

She moved her head just in time to avoid another pillow that Kazumi launched at her. To avoid any more attacks, she escaped to the hallway outside of the apartment. 

“Good morning, Syd!”

“Syd? I’ve never had a nickname like that before,” she replied. 

“Oh, sorry, I kinda just came up with it,” Zen apologized, clearly embarrassed. “Would you rather have me call you Sydnee instead?”

“Nah, you’re fine. I kinda like the sound of Syd!”

“Oh, OK good.” Zen let out a sigh of relief, then asked, “Man, did you see the chatroom earlier?”

The RFA chatroom? Maybe V had come back to tell them the party date? “No? What happened?”

“Mr. Silver Spoon dumped even more work on Jaehee than usual. Ah, he makes me so mad! While he goofs off with his stupid cat, Jaehee has to cover for him!”

If it has to do with Jaehee, then the Mr. Silver Spoon Zen was referring to had to be Jumin. No wonder he was so mad. 

“That’s horrible! I feel so bad for Jaehee!” Sydnee exclaimed.

“Exactly! Ugh, Jumin, that guy I swear…” Zen trailed off, then let out an  _ oh _ as he remembered something. “Right, I saw Juliana mention that she was also the CEO of her own company?”

“Yeah? What about it?” Sydnee asked, taking a strand of her hair and twirling it around her finger.

“It just makes sense now why she reminded me of Jumin, y’know—”

“Hey,” Sydnee cut in, surprising herself with the sharpness of her tone. “Juliana’s not like Jumin. She can be a bit pushy and standoffish at times, but she’d never overwork her employees like that, and the only reason she’s taking a vacation is because we asked her to spend some time with us.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, I didn’t mean that she was exactly like him, just that there were some similarities! I’m sure if I talked to her more I’d like her just fine!” Zen reassured her. 

Sydnee slouched into the wall. Of course he wasn’t trying to say anything bad about Juliana, she was just jumping to conclusions. “Sorry. It’s just that, well, even though we bicker she’s still my friend, you know?”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it.” He paused for a minute, then continued, “Anyway, that wasn’t the reason I called. I wanted to tell you that the cast for the musical I’m starring in is being finalized today, and that rehearsals start tomorrow!”

Sydnee’s heart skipped a beat. They were finalizing the cast list? Would she be on it?

“That’s great Zen!” she said when she realized that the silence was starting to drag on.

“Yeah! Oh, sorry If I woke you up by calling you. I know it’s kinda early…”

“Don’t worry about it! I mean, you did wake me up, but it’s fine! I like hearing news about the musical!”

Zen laughed. “I’m glad! I’ll make sure to keep you updated!” Now, I’m about to head out for a run.”

“Oh really? I haven’t done that in awhile. I should though, since I’ll need to keep in shape if I get this job I applied for.” Sydnee wrinkled her nose and mentally corrected herself.  _ When, not if. I’ll get a part! _

“We should go on a run together sometime! Yoosung and Jaehee have already met some of the new members in person, so I’m not worried about you being a dangerous person.”

Now it was Sydnee’s turn to laugh. “Nope, no dangerous individuals here! Depending on where you usually run, I’ll let you know if I can meet you there! Probably not today though.”

“Sure, I’ll text you the address later. Well, I’m off. Talk to you later, Syd!”

“Talk to you later!” Sydnee hung up and strolled back into the apartment. Kazumi and Mi-na were still sleeping, so she tried to be as quiet as possible as she settled back down onto the makeshift bed. Scrolling through images of Zen’s musicals, a thread of doubt wormed its way into her brain. Could she really get into one of his musicals with barely any experience outside of college?

_ Yes,  _ she decided.  _ Or no. Maybe so. _

✧✧✧

Usually she’d be so excited to shop for ingredients. But after reading the chatroom logs on the way to the store, Moira was too busy being worried for Jaehee. She had just seemed so stressed in the chatroom!

She chewed on her lip as her hand hovered over a package of chocolate chips. All this worrying over Jaehee was making Moira indecisive on the pancake ingredients. 

Noticing her hesitation, Juliana elbowed her in the shoulder. “Hey, either buy them or don’t. We’re wasting time just standing here.” As usual, any time being wasted ticked Juliana off, even though she wanted to keep Moira out long enough to let the others get some more sleep. 

Moira gave up on the chocolate chips and headed over to look at the fruit instead. She picked up a package of blueberries, put it back down, and proceeded to repeat the process with all of the fruit in the aisle. 

“Moira.” Juliana stepped into her path as she reached for another container of fruit. “I’ll pick out the ingredients. You go call Jaehee.”

“But—” Moira’s protests were cut off as Juliana took the shopping basket from her hands and pushed her towards the door.

“You were looking at the fruit, but I’m sure you want something sugary as well, so I’ll get the chocolate chips and some strawberries. I already know what to get for the pancake batter as well.” Juliana scribbled notes on her notepad as she spoke. 

“Thank you Juliana!” Moira exclaimed, then ran out of the store. She pulled out her phone and skimmed the RFA app until she found Jaehee’s number. Hopefully she wouldn’t be too busy to answer.

Jaehee picked up on the third ring. “Hello? Moira?”

“Jaehee!” Moira bounced on her toes at the sound of her voice. “I’m sorry I wasn’t in the chatroom earlier! How are you right now? Do you have too much work? Are you stressed? We could go to a coffee shop if you need a break!”

“Calm down Moira, I’m fine.” Jaehee sounded a little flustered by Moira’s rapid fire questioning. “I can’t leave my work to get coffee right now, but I appreciate the thought.”

At that Moira deflated a little. Aw, she really wanted to see Jaehee in person again. Well, she was supposed to make breakfast for her friends, so it was probably for the best. “Ok, well, didn’t you mention some of Zen’s musicals when you last called?” she asked, changing the subject.

“Oh, yes! If you haven’t seen any yet, there are a few that I’d recommend to you!”

“I’d love that! Then we can talk about them. Maybe… over some coffee when you’re free?”

“Um, well, I’m not free very often, but I’ll try.”

“Great! Send me the titles so I can watch them later!”

“I will do that. Thank you for calling me, Moira.”

“No problem!” Moira did a little excited dance that earned her some looks from a few passersby. Juliana, who was just coming out of the store with their ingredients, merely rolled her eyes.

“I’m afraid that I have to get back to work now, but I’ll send you the musical titles later, okay?”

“Aww, already?” Moira pulled her lips into a pout, even though Jaehee couldn’t see it. “Couldn’t we talk for a little while longer?”

“I’m afraid not. I’m really sorry Moira.”

Ugh, Jaehee was always so busy! “Fineee. Bye Jaehee! Talk to you later!”

“Goodbye, Moira.”

After she hung up, Moira turned towards Juliana, who was waiting for her to finish. 

“Feeling better now?” Juliana asked, raising an eyebrow. 

“Yup! Back to 100% energy!” Moira struck a pose, fist in the air. Juliana rubbed the bridge of her nose.

“Yeah, yeah, that’s great. Come on then, help me take these back to the apartment.”

✧✧✧

Kazumi grumbled as hesitant poking jolted her from an interesting dream. Opening one of her eyes, she saw her best friend standing by the bed, still in her pajamas. 

“Sorry Kazumi, I didn’t want to bother you… but Juliana said that breakfast is ready so…” Mi-na trailed off and rubbed the nape of her neck. 

“Ugh, what time is it?” Kazumi asked groggily. As per usual, she didn’t fall asleep until the early morning hours, so she was exhausted. 

“It’s almost 9:30 now. Moira was experimenting with different pancake recipes and Juliana fell back asleep. Sydnee didn’t bother to wake us up for the first batch of pancakes, but at least we can eat the second!”

“Hey, I was looking for some inspiration for getting into character!” Sydnee protested from the kitchen area. 

“Get into character for what? It’s not as if you have a job!” Juliana resorted from the couch. 

“And I won’t get one with that attitude,” Sydnee fired back. Kazumi groaned and stuffed her head under a pillow. She loved her friends, but it was still way too early for this nonsense.

Suddenly two arms wrapped themselves around her middle. She yelped in surprise as she was half picked up, half dragged out of the bed by Moira. 

“Rise and shine!!!! The pancakes are ready and deee-licious! C’mon Kazumi, join us!”

Kazumi wanted to crawl back into bed, but after that rude awakening she knew that she would no longer be able to sleep. So instead she shuffled over to the couch, muttering about how annoyed she was at being woken up. Juliana and Sydnee were taking up most of the couch by the time she got there, so she sat on the arm of it, with Mi-na coming over to sit beside her. Moira grinned and handed her a plate of strawberry pancakes. 

“See? Having breakfast with your friends is better than any sleep!” she exclaimed.

“So says you,” Sydnee said while rolling her eyes. 

“I actually don’t mind getting up to have breakfast with everyone,” Mi-na said. “I’ve enjoyed having you all over.”   


Kazumi gave her a slight smile. “I’m glad we could take your mind off of the RFA situation.”

“Yeah, about that. I saw that V was going to tell us the party date. When do you think it will be?” Sydnee asked.

Juliana chewed on her pancakes thoughtfully. “I hope that we’ll have enough time to prepare it.”

“I hope it comes as soon as possible! I want to see all of the other members at the party!” Moira rubbed her hands together. “I wonder if they’ll like what I’m planning to bake!

“I kinda agree with Moira,” Mi-na said. “If everything gets sorted out with the party and the hacker, then I probably can go back home.”

“You don’t have to stay here you know,” Kazumi pointed out. “Sure, having a possible witness might deter the hacker from breaking in. But it also might not, you know?”

Mi-na flinched and began to fiddle with her bangs which she hid her eyes behind. Kazumi pressed her lips together. She should have said that more gently, so as not to scare Mi-na.

Glancing between the two, Sydnee gave Mi-na a little punch on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, I was planning on staying here another night anyway. We can like, set traps for the hacker or something!”

Mi-na chuckled, looking a little less worried. Juliana snorted. 

“Be honest Sydnee, you’re only staying another night so you can avoid your landlord again.”

“Shut up Juliana! I’ll have a job soon!”

Whatever her reasoning, Kazumi was grateful that Sydnee had spoken up. She probably would have somehow made the situation worse if she tried to talk to Mi-na herself.

“Anyway, I’d stay with you Mi-na, but I cannot stand to sleep on the floor again,” Juliana said. “I barely got any sleep.”

“Maybe you got insomnia just like Kazumi,” Sydnee said with a smirk.

“Trust me, she hasn’t,” Kazumi said. “I’m sure your sleep schedule will go back to normal after sleeping in the bed at your hotel.”

“Oh my gosh, the cat hotel is absolutely the best! Kazi, you should come sleep over!” Moira suggested.

“I don’t know if I’d be able to. It’s pretty far away from school.” Kazumi cast a glance at a clock on the wall. “Speaking of school, I have an afternoon class today. Not to mention some group projects that I need to work on.”

“Aw, does that mean you’re leaving?” Mi-na gave Kazumi a puppy dog-eyed pout. “I was hoping that you could stay for a little bit longer…”

“Ah, well, you know me. I gotta get work done.” Kazumi rested her hand on Mi-na’s shoulder. “I’ll come visit again soon. Plus,” she added, “you have Sydnee, our own little future star, here to entertain you.”

“Hey! You’re mocking me!” Sydnee accused. “We’ll see who’s laughing after I get the job I auditioned for! Then you’ll all feel sorry for doubting my awesomeness!”

“Uh huh, sure Sydnee,” said Juliana, clearly doubtful.

“I believe in you Sydnee! Keep chasing your dreams!” Moira gave Sydnee a big thumbs up. 

Kazumi let out a small laugh at the small debate that was started. She gave Mi-na a small wave, then slipped out of the apartment before she could be convinced to stay.

The apartment was a bit far from her university, so on the bus ride there she took out her sketchbook and started doodling. The doodle slowly took the form of her and her friends sitting down to eat breakfast. It had been quite awhile since she had relaxed even that much, so it wasn’t surprising that it was still on her mind. Too bad she didn’t let herself stay for a little while longer.

The bus arrived near her university not long after Kazumi finished the sketch, and she walked the rest of the way to the campus. Finally arriving at her dorm room, Kazumi looked at her list of work that she had to do. Luckily for her she had already completed half of her work for the group project, so it wouldn’t take long to finish it. Before doing that, however, she needed to get her clothes from the washing machine. But that wouldn’t take more than a few minutes.

Kazumi was soon proven wrong. Her clothes were washed, but all of the dryers were full. Running a finger over her wet clothes, Kazumi tried to think of some way that she could get them dry. There was the option of hanging them up. But no, there wasn’t enough space in her room for that. It wasn’t as if she could just leave her clothes in the washing machine all day either. Other people needed to get their clothes washed too. 

Suddenly, her eyes landed on a dryer that was finished drying the clothes inside of it. An idea popped into her head. If she just took out the other clothes, she could use the dryer!

Only hesitating for a moment, Kazumi began to pull the clothes from the dryer. It was a bit rude of her, but if she folded up the clothing and left a note, it would be fine. Right?

As she took out the last piece of clothing from the dryer, a voice rang out from behind her.

“Hey! What are you doing with my clothes?!”

She whirled on her heels to come face to face with a familiar pair of purple eyes. His face mirrored her own wide-eyed shock at finding him there.   


“Ah, um, Yoosung. Hi.” Kazumi wanted to bang her head against a wall. Speaking just wasn’t her thing today.

“Oh… oh! Kazumi! What— what are you doing?” Yoosung still seemed upset that she was taking out his clothes, but the surprise of finding her there must have dampened it a bit. 

“Ack, Yoosung, I’m sorry. I needed to put my clothes in the dryer, but there were no empty ones and yours seemed like it was done so…” The words came out in a frantic stream as Kazumi twisted one of his shirts in her hand. Catching him looking at the shirt, she quickly dropped it onto the pile of his other clothes.  _ Great, now he probably thinks I’m a creep. _

To her surprise, Yoosung apologized as well. “Oh, sorry, I was just about to get my clothes out of the dryer. I probably held you up.” He stepped around her to start collecting his clothes into the basket he’d brought with him. 

“No, it’s fine. I shouldn’t have taken your clothes out of the dryer anyway,” Kazumi protested. She moved to help him, but then stopped. It’d probably just make things more awkward.

“Well… If you’re sorry, then do you wanna go play LOLOL with me?” he asked, throwing her a hopeful grin.

“Uh, sure. I should be able to finish most of my work by the time you—”

“No,” Yoosung interrupted, “I mean, can we go play LOLOL right now?”

Right now? But… “I have class to go to. Plus, I have to do some work for a group project.”

“Well, it’s 10:30ish now. When is your class?”

“It starts at 3 PM…”

“And when do you have to turn in your part of the group project?”

Kazumi hesitated to tell him, as he had totally backed her into a corner. “…Not until later tonight…”

“Okay then!” Yoosung pumped his fist in the air. “We have a few hours to get you introduced to the world of LOLOL! C’mon, let’s just do it!”

Kazumi crossed her arms and hesitated. It wasn’t as if going to play LOLOL with Yoosung was a completely bad idea, but she came back to the university to get some work done, not waste time. Why was he so persistent about this?

Seeing her hesitation, Yoosung let out a dramatic sigh and slumped his shoulders. “I guess it was just an empty apology after all. I’ll just have to return to my dorm, where I will sit alone… with no one to keep me company…”

“Pffft!” Kazumi let out an involuntary laugh. That was the most dramatic guilt-tripping she had seen in awhile. “I didn’t know you were such a drama king,” she said, still shaking with laughter. 

He looked away with a slight blush blooming on his cheeks. “I’m not really, I just want you to play LOLOL with me!”

_ Well, since he’s trying so hard, I might as well indulge him _ , Kazumi told herself. “Fine, fine. I’ll play LOLOL with you right now. Just let me put my clothes in the dryer.”

“YES!” Yoosung looked pleased that he actually got her to accept his invitation. “Oh yeah, by the way, you have an app to voice call people on, right?”

Kazumi shook her head. “No, do you need one to play LOLOL?”

“Not really, it would just be easier to talk to you that way. Hmm…” He furrowed his brow. “Oh, I know! Let’s go to an internet cafe! I can show you how to play it there!”

“I can just get something that will let me do voice calls…” Seeing his face droop in disappointment, she quickly added, “…but for today I guess we can go to an internet cafe.”

“Alright! Meet me at the bus stop in a few minutes! I have to go put my clothes away first!” said Yoosung, before running off to do just that. 

Kazumi wondered how she let herself get roped into doing this as she put her clothes into the dryer. “It’s because he’s like a puppy,” she decided. A big puppy, with really, really big purple eyes… 

It was only after she had arrived at the bus stop that she realized that she could have asked him if  _ he _ had work to do.

✧✧✧

The email had come in. All she had to do was open it. That was all. 

But she was too nervous! Sydnee paced around a bench in the park again. As soon as the email about the cast list dropped into her inbox, she excused herself from the apartment to go for a run. If she didn’t get the job, she didn’t want her friends to see her get upset.

“Ahh, what am I thinking?” Sydnee flopped down onto the bench. “Of course I got a role! It’s me we’re talking about!” She repeated herself, this time in a whisper, “It’s me we’re talking about.”

She took a deep breath and licked her lips. Finally gathering up the courage, Sydnee moved her finger to click on the email notification. What she clicked on instead was the RFA notification that had popped up the second before her finger touched the screen. Sydnee groaned. Just when she was ready to read the email too. An RFA chatroom opened up right away.

Sydnee grinned at her screen. Jumin and Seven made an odd pair, but it was fun getting to talk to them in the chatroom. Everyone in the RFA seemed so cool. Well, Jumin was a bit hard on Jaehee. Maybe she could fix that. A hobby would distract him from how much work Jaehee was doing! She could introduce him to a few dramas… 

Right, it wasn’t the time for that. She had to look at the email. Enough stalling.

Taking a deep breath to steady her nerves, Sydnee tapped on the notification and the email popped up on her screen. “Ah, no reason to be nervous, no reason to be nervous,” she muttered to herself. Scrolling through the list of names, it wasn’t long before she spotted one that made her jump right off of the bench with a whoop. Needing to share the good news, Sydnee immediately dialed a number.

A surprised and slightly confused voice answered the phone. “Hello? Syd?”

“Zen!!! I did it! I got a part!!!” Finally, she’d have a job, and she’d even get to work with Zen!

“Whoa, really?! What show did you audition for?”

She told Zen the name of the musical, adding that she had kept it a secret because she wanted to surprise him.

His excitement was palpable. “Nice! That means we’ll be working together! I’ll get to meet you in person!” Sydnee was pleased that he was as eager to work with her as she was to work with him. “So, what role did you get?” Zen asked.

“Hm?” She was so excited to see her name in the list of cast that she hadn’t checked what role she’d gotten. That was fine though, it had to be a leading role anyway. After all, her name was so high up on the list—

Sydnee’s sunny smile turned into a frown as she checked the role once, then twice. It wasn’t the lead role at all, or even one of a well-liked sidekick. This was the one that people disliked, one of the saboteurs in many romantic dramas.

The role of the jealous best friend.

✧✧✧

“So first I make an account for LOLOL?”

Yoosung and Kazumi were sitting in a nearby internet cafe, waiting for a web page to load so she could sign up. In the meantime, Yoosung logged into his LOLOL account, Superman Yoosung.

“Yup! I’ll be on as well. Since I’m sitting right next to you, I can see your screen! So I can help if you have any questions!” Yoosung grinned at her, looking absolutely thrilled. Again she wondered what it was about this game that made him so happy. Even Mi-na never seemed this excited to play a new game with her. Then again, maybe it was because Yoosung didn’t have many chances to play LOLOL with people he knew in person, since none of the RFA members seemed inclined to play it.

Turning her attention back to the screen, Kazumi made an account for the game. The download button popped up on the screen, and she hesitated, throwing a glance Yoosung’s way. “Are we allowed to download games at an internet cafe?” she asked him.

“Yeah,” he replied, completely focused on his screen. “You just have to delete it before you leave.”

Another question followed the last and she hesitated again. “Hey, how much is this gonna cost?”

“Don’t worry, I already paid for our use!”

_ Hm. Well, less money out of my pocket _ , she supposed. Kazumi turned back towards her screen and downloaded the game. As soon as it opened up, she logged in and started the tutorial. Not that she needed it, as Yoosung had noticed that the game was open and immediately started to echo the tutorial.

“So this thing is a connector. You have to destroy these to…”

The game was actually a little more complicated than she was expecting. It had elements of strategy that she never had expected Yoosung to be into. Maybe he’d enjoy another strategy game that Mi-na had shown her, though it wasn’t all that similar to LOLOL. What was it…? Blaze Insignia…?

Yoosung snapped her out of her musings, calling her attention back to the game. “Ok, these are the heroes that are available from the free rotation for this week. Depending on what class you wanna play as, I can suggest a few easy ones.”

“Um, I guess I can try a fighter for now. Seems like a class that will be good for learning the basics with.” Yoosung immediately launched into the quality and ease of play for the fighters available, and once Kazumi had finally selected a hero, he showed her how to add friends. 

“You already know this, but my username is Superman Yoosung! I’m using the hero Niicu right now, so be on the lookout for that.”

“Yeah, I got it. You’ll be getting an invite from a Kazi Painter soon.”

“Kazi Painter? You paint?” he asked.

“Well, yeah. I told you that I was an art major, didn’t I?”

“Oh, well yeah, you did.” Yoosung looked away from her, probably embarrassed at having forgotten. “That’s pretty cool though!”

“Thanks. Maybe I’ll show them to you sometime.”

“Oh yeah, weren’t you going to sell some paintings at the RFA party? I’ll get to see them then!”

“Yeah, I guess you will.”

As if they had summoned him by mentioning the party, a notification from the RFA app showed that V was online and had opened up a chatroom.

“V?” said Yoosung. He narrowed his eyes at his phone.

“He might be about to tell us the date of the party.” Kazumi was relieved. Finally, they would have something to plan around. “Let’s see what it is,” she said, clicking on the open chatroom. Yoosung looked reluctant, but followed her into the chatroom.

Kazumi glanced at Yoosung. His face was all screwed up in a frown with his narrowed eyes pinpointed on the screen. She tapped a finger on his shoulder.

“Yoosung, calm down. Take some deep breaths,” she told him. “I know it’s frustrating that V won’t talk to you about these things, but getting upset won’t solve anything. He’ll just treat you like a petulant child.”

At that he sat up in his chair and tried to relax his face. After making sure that he was calm enough to continue, Kazumi turned her gaze back to the chatroom.

“Now just what about V makes you get so upset?” Kazumi asked, turning back to Yoosung. 

Yoosung sighed. “He just keeps so many secrets and makes Seven lie for him. It’s so frustrating!” He kicked the leg of the table and winced. “I… I’m sorry Kazumi. I lost my temper. Can we pick up playing LOLOL later, after I’ve calmed down a bit?”

“Uh, yeah, sure. I should get back to working anyway.” Kazumi bit down on the disappointment that welled up. She wanted to get her work done anyway. So it shouldn’t bother her this much that he was leaving.

“No, you don’t have to leave. I paid for at least an hour on these computers, so play as long as you like.” He flashed a smile at her, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “See you later.”

Kazumi watched as he left the internet cafe. She had only met him a few days ago, and it wasn’t as if she was incredibly eager to play LOLOL with him. So why was she so frustrated at seeing him leave?

✧✧✧

Mi-na let out a yawn and reclined in her chair. She had finally worked out an error in the code and was exhausted. It wasn’t as if her friends had given her an excuse to procrastinate any further either. Moira and Juliana had left around lunch, and Sydnee had come back from her run looking pensive. She didn’t say very much to Mi-na, other than to tell her that she was going to her apartment for another change of clothes before she left.

The apartment was very quiet compared to the previous day. How had Rika not gone crazy just sitting in here, all alone, to plan parties? Mi-na wished that she could just call Kazumi to come back, or tell Sydnee to hurry up with getting her clothes. But she didn’t want to bother them. Kazumi was busy with work from her university, and there had to be some reason that Sydnee was talking so long… 

Looking for something to distract her from the silence, Mi-na pulled out her phone and tapped on the RFA app. Certainly there would be at least one of the members on. One of her friends might even be on, scrolling through the chatrooms just like her.

She opened up a chatroom for people to join if they wanted to talk, then started to scroll through a few old ones to pass the time.“Hmm, let’s see… Oh! V was on earlier?” Mi-na exclaimed in surprise. He had set the date of the party in the chatroom, and it was… two weeks from today?! “Oooh, we’re gonna be swamped in work!” Once again Mi-na was regretting replying to that Unknown person in the first chatroom. If she hadn’t tried to help him out, then maybe she and her friends wouldn’t have gotten dragged into this… 

That train of thought was derailed as soon a certain red-head made his appearance into her chatroom.

Worried for Seven’s health, Mi-na started to browse the internet for some quick meals he could prepare. She wanted to tell him that he shouldn’t just have chips to eat. But if he said he was fine, then maybe she shouldn’t bother him about it.

She was startled out of her thoughts by the apartment door, which has suddenly swung open. Mi-na crouched behind her chair and raised her phone into the air, poised to throw it at a possible intruder. Sydnee, spotting her as she walked through the door, raised her hands and started waving them back and forth frantically. 

“Don’t throw your phone! It’s just me!” She tried to raise the bags she was carrying in an effort to protect her face. Mi-na lowered her phone and let the tension drop from her shoulders. For a minute there she thought that maybe the hacker had been able to bypass Seven’s security.

“Anyway, sorry for leaving so suddenly. As an apology, I got us dinner~” Sydnee said in a singsong voice, waltzing over to the couch and placing the bags down on it.

“Oh, it’s fine. You just had to get your stuff, right?” Mi-na said. She didn’t want to tell Sydnee that she had felt lonely without her around.

“Well, if it’s fine then dig in! I’ve got some exciting news to tell you!” Sydnee started taking out the food as she told Mi-na about her new role in one of Zen’s musicals. Mi-na was proud of her friend, but her mind soon turned back to her worry over Seven’s dinner.

“Hel-lo! Earth. To. Mi-na!” Sydnee grabbed her hands and forced her to stand up, whirling her around the room until she dizzily collapsed onto the couch. “Eat! This isn’t just some cheap ramen, you know!”

“I know, I just was…”

“Worried about that hacker?” Sydnee asked. “Don’t worry, I got a plan for that. We’re gonna have so much fun tonight! All of your worries will disappear, like poof!” She spread her hands like a magician preparing to do a disappearing act. “Now, eat! Then we shall commence the operation!”

Oh boy, Sydnee was really getting into this. Mi-na didn’t have the heart to tell her that Seven had already solved her worries about the security of the apartment. So instead she smiled and took a bite of the food.

“Okay, thank you Sydnee.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize that this is a week late, but I hope that the length makes up for it!


	6. Chapter 5

Kazumi let out a groan into her pillow from frustration. Once again, she could not seem to fall asleep no matter what she did. At this point it was too late for her to be well rested the following morning. 

That wasn’t the main issue, however. The most problematic issue was that tonight her brain decided to fixate on Yoosung. He had seemed so upset after talking to V earlier that day, and she couldn’t help but feel a little bit responsible. After all, she was the one who suggested that they talk to V in the first place. 

“Ughhhhh!” Finally giving up on sleeping, Kazumi sat up and pulled out her laptop from beside her bed. It was still early enough, or late enough, for Yoosung to be playing LOLOL. Maybe she could catch him there. Though, first she needed to download something to take voice calls on, to save her the trouble of holding up her phone. What was that app called again? Ah, right, Discordance. 

Creating an account and downloading the app was simple. It was when she ran into the friends list that she had a problem. Guessing his username wouldn’t be too hard, but his DiscordanceTag could be anything. Looks like she would have to text Yoosung and hope that he wasn’t too busy to respond. 

It must have been Kazumi’s lucky day, because Yoosung responded almost immediately. He asked why she needed it, but she ignored the text and sent him a friend request, along with opening a direct message. 

The last message was immediately followed with his profile picture popping up on the screen, letting Kazumi know that he was calling. She clicked on the button to join, and with a few adjustments to her audio, she was able to hear him. 

“Alright, I can hear you now. Hey, Yoosung.”

“Kazumi! I can’t believe you’re still up!”

“Insomnia sucks, so yeah, I’m still up.”

“That sounds awful, but is it bad that I’m happy you are awake? I’m just really glad I get to talk to you!”

“Nah, you’re fine.”

“Cool! So did you have something to talk to me about, or were you just setting up Discordance and saying hi?”

Kazumi opened her mouth to reply, but then closed it again. Would it sound weird if she told him she was worried about him? Deciding to leave him out of her reasons for losing sleep, she instead said, “I was just awake and bored, so I was hoping… well I guess I was hoping that we could play LOLOL for a little bit.”

“Oooh, I got you hooked, didn’t I?” Yoosung taunted.

“Um, no. I told you, I’m just bored. You were the only person I could think of that would be awake at this hour.”

“Haha, no need to lie! Don’t worry, the team I usually play with logged off for the night, so I’ll be able to join you on your quests.”

It would seem that he was back in high spirits at least. That was good. “Yeah, OK, just let me download it onto my computer.” As she pulled up the website, a thought slipped into her mind. “By the way, why is your Discordance username Shooting Star Yoosung?”

“Oh, there’s this meteor that’s also named Yoosung, and shooting stars are another name for meteors, so I thought it fit.”

“Oh, I didn’t know you were interested in astronomy.”

“Not exactly. It’s just that the Meteor Study Club here tried to get me to join several times because of my name.”

Kazumi had to raise an eyebrow at that. “Just because of your name? What a weird club.”

“Yeah, they can be weird. And really, really passionate about meteors. I bet their club room is filled with meteor-themed decorations.”

“Hah, then it's a good thing they aren’t in charge of the decoration for the party, huh?”

“Haha, yeah. Speaking of the party, though, we could invite the president of the club!”

Invite the leader of the people obsessed with meteors? Kazumi would usually mark that as a bad idea, but with the party in two weeks, they needed to find guests quickly. “I mean, I guess we could. Do you have the president’s contact information?”

“Yup. I got it one of the times she was trying to recruit me. Who should I send it to?”

“Send it to Mi-na. I don’t think she’s gotten any emails to answer yet. Plus, Juliana or Sydnee probably wouldn’t know how to handle it.”

They shared a chuckle over that, and Yoosung promised to get in touch with the Meteor Study Club’s president. Kazumi pulled out her phone and sent Mi-na a quick text about it. Maybe they would be able to have a good party after all. 

“Anyway, once you’ve gotten LOLOL up, meet me in the town so we can start!”

Without the distraction that V had been earlier, Yoosung and Kazumi fell into a pattern while completing quests. Kazumi would accept the quests, as she was the beginner who needed to level up, then she and Yoosung would work together to create a strategy to destroy connectors. She had to admit, it was a lot more relaxing than trying to do more school work or painting. They game did require focus, but the punishments for not doing so were less severe than the other two. 

In between quests, Kazumi decided to try to get to know Yoosung a little better. 

“So, how did you go from veterinary science to gaming, Yoosung?” she asked.

“Huh? Oh, I dunno. I used to be a top student in high school, but… Well, once I got to college I guess I got tired of working so hard, haha.”

“Really? You used to be a top student?”

“Yup. Looking at pictures of myself from back then feels weird. Oh! I do have a picture that the RFA took during the last RFA party! Hold on, I’ll send it to you.”

About a minute later her phone pinged, showing her that Yoousung had sent the text. Kazumi opened it to see a photo with a few slightly familiar faces. Most of them looked the same as she had seen them in their profile pictures, just younger. Most of them, except for…

“Wait, Yoosung, you used to have brown hair?!”

“Oh, yeah, I dyed it when I got to college. The blond hair suits me, don’t you think?”

“I guess? You do look more studious in this picture, though.”

“Well, I was the student body president back then. It would have been weird if I had dyed my hair.”

“Interesting.” Kazumi organized some items in her inventory before asking, “Well, what made you want to major in veterinary science?”

“Uh, well…” Yoosung said, a note of hesitation creeping into his voice. 

A brief silence ensued, broken only when Kazumi said, “Er, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“No, it’s fine. I wanted to become a vet because of Rika. But now… well, I don’t know. I’m thinking about changing my major.”

“Don’t stay indecisive for too long. It costs money to attend college, you know,” Kazumi reminded Yoosung.

“Yeah, I know, I know.” Yoosung laughed at some realization, then said, “Now that I think about it, Rika probably would have said the same thing.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah…”

More silence followed, making Kazumi want to slap a hand to her forehead. Why did she have to keep steering every conversation she was involved in into an awkward silence? “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” she apologized.

“Ah, no, I’m not uncomfortable! I mean, sometimes you remind me a bit of Rika when you talk, but it makes me happy, to be honest!”

Oh. Well, now she was the uncomfortable one. Kazumi opened her mouth to somehow reply to that, but a yawn came out instead. 

“Oh sorry, are you tired? You can go to sleep if you want. We did do a lot of quests today.”

“Uh, I guess I am? Sorry, it’s been awhile since I’ve felt sleepy so early.”

“Oh yeah, you did say that you have insomnia. Well, I guess you can try sleeping now! Hopefully you’ll be able to fall asleep!”

For once, Kazumi felt that she could agree with that. She actually felt like she could go to sleep before four in the morning this time. “OK then, talk to you later, Yoosung. Don’t stay up too much longer if you have morning classes to go to.”

“I’ll try! Bye Kazumi!”

She hung up the call and exited LOLOL. After putting her laptop away, she flopped back down onto her bed, eyes already fluttering closed.

“Who would’ve expected Mi-na to be right? I can’t believe that playing LOLOL was what made me sleepy…” Kazumi let out another yawn, and it wasn’t long before she was fast asleep.

✧✧✧

Sydnee started the day raring to go. She finally had a job and a script to learn! Sure, she didn’t get a role that she especially liked, but that was no reason to be all upset. After all, she would be working with Zen!

Speaking of Zen, Sydnee wanted to go on a run with him. She needed to build up her stamina if she was going to be performing after all. And he did offer to exercise with her!

So she dialed up his number, hoping that it wasn’t too early in the morning for him to be awake. 

Luckily for her, he picked up almost right away. “Hey Syd!”

“Hey Zen! I hope I didn’t wake you up!”

“Nope, not at all. What’s up?”

“Well, I was wondering if you would still like to go running together, and if we could do that this morning.”

“Sure! I’ll send you the address of the park I run at. Meet you there in 45 minutes?”

“Yup, see you then!”

Sydnee hung up and pumped her fist into the air. Zen would go running with her! Her excitement fizzled somewhat when she realized that she only had 45 minutes to get ready. Most of which was spent finding the perfect outfit to wear. Sydnee finally settled on an orange and white tracksuit, hoping that it would make her look fit and stylish. Grabbing a small bag to store her phone and keys in, she called a taxi and made her way to the park.

Zen had told her to look for a little clearing in the woods a bit off of the main path. It would provide them privacy away from other people who may be his fans. After all, if his fans knew that he was meeting up with her they’d probably go ballistic.

Sydnee shook her head to derail that train of thought. She wasn’t here to worry about his fans, she was here to finally meet Zen in person! Sydnee continued to look around the path for the clearing, until she finally spotted what might be it. A man with long silver hair in a sleek black tracksuit stood in the middle of the clearing. He turned in her direction as she entered the clearing, and his scarlet red eyes caught her off guard. Yes, this definitely was…

“Zen!” Sydnee tried not to appear too eager as she sauntered over to him.

“Oh! You must be Sydnee!” Zen flashed her one of his dazzling smiles. “Wow, you’re even cuter than I thought you were!”

Sydnee’s face flushed. She wasn’t expecting him to compliment her! “And— and you look even better in person than you do in your selfies!” It was true, his selfies didn’t truly do him justice. Standing before him was like standing next to a prince. But, that was enough staring. They were here to run after all. She placed her bag down and stretched her hands up over her head. “Shall we get started then?”

“Ready when you are!”

After a bit of stretching, they started their run. It was quiet between them at first, as they each tried to get used to seeing each other in person. Soon, however, Sydnee’s competitiveness took over and she started challenging Zen to a series of races. Most of which she lost, of course. It had been a while since he had anything to workout for. Yet, in the last race she managed to edge past Zen just far enough to tag the tree they set as their finish line before he did. 

“Whoo hoo! Sydnee Morgan wins the race! She cannot be surpassed!” she yelled, pumping her fist in the air. 

Zen reached the tree and leaned against it to catch his breath. He glanced sideways at her and grinned. “Yes, Sydnee cannot be surpassed, except by the handsome Zen, who won all of the previous races,” he teased. 

She stuck her tongue out at him and proceeded to flop down onto the ground. “This is only the start of my win streak.”

“Well, to more of your wins,” he said, handing her a water bottle. She nodded in thanks and took a swig from the bottle. The running had almost completely exhausted her. She hadn't realized just how out of shape she’d let herself become. No matter, she’d just have to work out more often.

“Did you eat breakfast yet?” he asked, ruffling through the bag he had brought with him.

“Hm? Oh, I didn’t want to eat anything heavy before exercising, so no.”

Zen nodded in understanding, then pulled out two breakfast sandwiches from his bag. “I usually bring one to eat, and I thought I’d bring another one just in case. They’re a little cold now but…”

Sydnee’s eyes grew wide at the sight of the sandwiches. He had even thought to bring her something to eat? It was too sweet of him! “Thanks Zen! But you didn’t have to get me food!”

“Don’t worry about it.” He handed her the breakfast sandwich, then sat down beside her, taking a bite out of his own sandwich. “So many of my fans watch my musicals so much that they forget to eat. I guess this caring side of me is an effect from that,” he explained. 

“Those poor fans!” Sydnee said in a melodramatic tone. “If only there was a way for the handsome Zen to make sure they all ate!”

“I guess I could ask for a post to be put up on my fan website, haha.”

“You have a fan website?” Well, of course he did. Sydnee didn’t know why she was asking such a stupid question.

“Yup. My fan club made it. Their leader is infatuated with my musicals though, so I doubt that she’d pay attention to the message.”

“I’m sure she’d listen if you told her in person,” Sydnee suggested with a wink.

“You mean, you want to invite her to the party?” Zen asked.

“Yeah, why not? I mean, we need to invite as many guests as soon as we can. And I plan to be the one to invite the most guests!” she crowed, placing a hand over her heart as if swearing an oath. 

Zen laughed. “Alright, if you think you can get her to come, then go for it. I’ll tell her to contact you.”

Yes! It was her time to shine!

Zen’s phone buzzed, so he pulled it out to check if he had gotten a message. “Oh, the director of the musical wants to speak with me today. Sorry, I’ll have to leave now,” he said, tossing an apologetic smile her way.

Sydnee shooed him with her hand. “Don’t worry about it! I had fun! And thanks for the breakfast sandwich!”

“No problem.” They both stood up and collected their bags. “I’ll see you tomorrow for another run?” Zen asked.

“Yup, you bet! I’m gonna beat you in every race!”

“You have some working out to do before you do that!”

“Just watch me!”

Zen smiled and waved as he turned to walk away. “See ya Syd!”

“See ya Zen!”

Back in her apartment, Sydnee collapsed onto her couch. In truth, she was way too tired to do any type of workout at the moment. Maybe she should just go over her script

“OK Sydnee!” she said, trying to psych herself up. “Get into the mindset of a jealous girl!”

No matter how much she tried though, her mind lingered on the run with Zen. How could she feel jealous when all of his attention had been focused on her? Sydnee was just about to give up and take a nap instead, when she received an email. It was from the leader of Zen’s fanclub! Perfect, she could use a fan’s jealousy to inspire her!

She opened the email and was immediately hit with the questions of how she knew Zen and what her relationship with him was. Sydnee grinned. Now this was the material she needed! By the time she got onto the stage she’d do so well that she’d only get lead roles from now on!

Sydnee was so ecstatic that she didn’t even notice the pair of mint-colored eyes that flashed outside her window.

✧✧✧

“I. AM. SO. BOOOORED!” Moira shouted for the fifth time that day.

“Why don’t you find something to entertain yourself with then?” Juliana said, rubbing the space between her eyebrows.

Moira pouted at her friend. “I would, but you said you wouldn’t do anything with me!”

“I told you, I’m busy.” Juliana motioned to the paper covering the desk she was sitting at. Upon closer inspection, Moira found that it was all notes on the RFA and party planning. 

“Lianaaaaa, we’re on vacation! You don’t have to work, you know!” She tried to swipe the notes off of the desk, but Juliana put up her hand to block her. 

“Moira, I’m trying to make sure that the party planning goes as smoothly as possible. If it is unorganized, then that just means more work for all of us. So go plan out what you’re baking for the party, or go do something useful.”

Moira flinched. What was Juliana’s problem? “Well, fine! I’m going out then!” Moira looked back as she stormed out to see if Juliana wanted to apologize, but she had just gone back to looking over her notes. With a huff, Moira left the hotel room, then stopped. She didn’t have anywhere in particular that she wanted to go. Well, not anywhere by herself. And since Juliana was refusing to go anywhere with her… 

She could take Jaehee to Temuki! Kazumi and Mi-na were always talking about how much they loved it, and Jaehee liked coffee, so it would be perfect! But Jaehee wouldn’t just come to Temuki if Moira called her. She would just say she was too busy. So Moira would have to ask her in person. What could possibly go wrong?

Well, seeing Jaehee in person was harder than she thought. 

“Miss, you can’t come in here unless you’re an employee, or if you have an appointment.” The security guards would not let her go past the C&R lobby, no matter how many times she told them she wanted to speak to Jaehee Kang. Moira was just about to give up and call her anyway, when, to her surprise, Jaehee stepped into the lobby. She stopped short when and her eyes widened when she spotted Moira next to the security.

“Moira! What are you doing here?”

“Jaehee!” Moira threw the security guards a triumphant smile before waltzing over to Jaehee. “I wanted to talk to you about Zen’s musicals! What are you doing right now? Do you want to go to a cafe with me?”

“U-um, I was just going to restock the coffee machine… But I’m sorry Moira, I can’t—”

“Pleaaaaseeeee?!” Moira grabbed Jaehee’s hands and put on her best impression of a begging puppy. “I promise, the cafe isn’t too far from here! And you don’t have to stay long!”

Jaehee hesitated and bit her lip. Moira batter eyes at her to try to give her pleading extra emphasis. Finally, Jaehee let out a sigh of defeat. 

“Okay, I guess the coffee at a cafe would taste better than the coffee here. But I’ll only stay for 15 minutes tops, okay?”

“Yes! Follow me!” Moira said as she interlaced her fingers with Jaehee’s. She dragged them out to the taxi that she had asked to wait for her, and they were off to Temuki. 

Once there, they ordered coffee, Moira asking for every sweet thing she could think of to be added, of course. The barista looked slightly horrified, but Moira soon got her diabetes-inducing drink. She then led Jaehee to an empty booth by one of the windows.

“So, what musicals did you want to talk about?” Jaehee asked as she sat down.

“Well, I was looking through the list, and the ones that caught my eye were Cube World and Zorro!”

“Oh, I’m surprised you found Cube World so quickly! That’s Zen’s debut work, and not many people got to see it. But Zen might star in Zorro again soon, and it is definitely worth paying the ticket price to go see it!”

“Ooh, tell me more about Zorro and Cube World please!!”

As Jaehee started to describe Zen’s performances in the musicals, Moira happened to see a flash of red hair walking outside the window. It wasn’t Juliana, but it made her remember how rude Juliana was to her earlier. Unconsciously, Moira started to frown, which Jaehee caught as she paused to take a sip of her coffee.

“Is there something wrong, Moira?” Jaehee’s face turned from one of excitement to worry.

“Oh, sorry! I didn’t mean to stop paying attention!”

“No, it’s fine. I just don’t usually see you not smiling. Did something happen?”

“Well… I asked Liana to hang out with me earlier, but she said she was too busy. But it’s fine, since I get to talk to you instead!”

“Aren’t you two here on a vacation? Why is she so busy?”

“I dunno, I think she said something about making sure that the party or the RFA ran smoothly or something.”

Jaehee stiffened. “The original members of the RFA can handle everything just fine,” she said curtly. “Juliana just needs to invite guests to the party.”

“Oh no, no, I didn’t mean to say that you guys were doing a bad job! Liana’s just weird like that! A bit of a control freak, you know?” Moira nervously spun her straw around in her coffee. If Jaehee got mad at her because of Juliana, that would be the worst!

Jaehee inhaled, then relaxed her shoulders. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to get so upset. But really, you should tell Juliana that there is no need to manage the RFA.”

Moira relaxed as well at her words. “Mmhm, I’ll do that!”

Jaehee took another sip of her coffee, then checked her phone as a message appeared on the screen. After reading it, she turned to face Moira again, an apologetic look in her eyes. “I have to get back to work now. Maybe we could continue this conversation another time?”

“Aww, already? You haven’t even finished your coffee!”

“I can just finish it at work. I’m really sorry Moira.” She stood up and started to gather her things. Moira just continued to stir her coffee with her straw. 

“I guess I’ll see you later?” Moira asked, shooting Jaehee a hopeful glance.

Jaehee returned that hope with a small, uncertain smile. “I’ll try my best.” She walked to the entrance, gave Moira a wave, then left her line of sight.

Moira sighed. She wasn’t expecting much, but… Why did no one seem to have time to hang out with her today?

Well, she couldn’t say that yet. There were three people she hadn’t asked after all.

Maybe one of them would keep her company.

✧✧✧

Juliana bit her lip in frustration. There was so much information about the party that she was missing, and of course V had picked this exact time to go on a trip. He might be busy, but in that case he shouldn’t have set the date of the party to be so soon. Then there would be enough time to get everything sorted out. 

Ruffling through her notes, Juliana went over them again. She needed to know if they already had set a location for the party, or if they expected her to find one. Other than the roles of the party planner and the leader, she didn’t know what each member did in the RFA, so she needed to find that out too. Was the party going to be formal or informal? How do guests donate their money? Why did V not seem to be on top of things like a leader should be?

A groan escaped her lips, and she flung her papers down onto the desk. Trying to figure out everything herself was getting her nowhere. She needed to ask someone who could tell her these things. 

Grabbing her phone from the bedside table, she sat down on her bed and opened a chatroom in the RFA app.

Juliana let herself fall backwards onto the bed, still fuming. Neither Jumin nor anyone else seemed to be seriously planning the party! And Jumin was supposed to be the next CEO of C&R. What a joke. It was obvious that Jaehee did half of his work for him.

A text message popped up on the screen, reading that it was from Jumin. “Speak of the devil,” Juliana muttered. She opened up the text, expecting answers to the questions she had asked. Instead, she found the thread flooded with pictures of… his cat, Elizabeth the 3rd. Underneath that read:

She almost threw her phone across the room. But that wouldn’t solve anything. So instead she opened the notes app and started writing. Hopefully this would help her to come up with a plan for the party. The RFA would thank her once it was successful.

✧✧✧

Mi-na looked up from the code she was working on to see that her phone had gotten several text messages in the last 10 minutes. Moira had sent all of them. Most of them asked if she could spend time with her. Some of them just wanted to know if she had seen the messages. Mi-na grabbed her phone off of the desk to answer her back.

Going to an arcade would be fun. Especially if it was with Moira, who’s over-the-top personality would make even the most boring games a ton of fun. And it would also give her the chance to take a break from work. Staring at a screen all day wasn’t exactly healthy, after all. Speaking of staring at screens…

Mi-na hovered her finger over the text thread between her and Seven. Moira was coming over in 30 minutes, but she still wanted to check on Seven first. Although, he might not appreciate her butting into his business. But at the same time… “Ohhh, what if he thinks I’m annoying for checking up on him?” She twirled her bangs around a finger, still staring at the screen, before she made up her mind to just ask Seven a game related question.

Mi-na was confused as Seven’s caller ID showed up on the screen. She answered and asked, “Seven? Why did you decide to call?”

“First, I was bored. Second, I wanted to hear a different voice than the people I work for. Third, I want to procrastinate, haha.”

“Seven, you should take a break if you’re working too much.” Her worry for him slipped out before she could stop herself. But Seven didn’t seem to mind.

“Eh, I’m fine. Anyway, the real reason I called was to give you some practice with a FPS game. There’s a really fun one at a lot of arcades around Rika’s apartment, and I think you’d like it.”

“But how will I play one from the apartment?”

“Simple, just watch your computer screen.”

As she turned her attention to her computer screen, it started downloading some kind of file. After it opened, she saw that it was some kind of beta version of a first person shooter game. “Is the game in the arcade? And how did you get control of my computer?!”

“Nope. But it’s still fun, even if it has a few bugs.” Seven pointedly ignored her second question and swiftly set up the game to have two players. Mi-na put her phone on speaker and set it down so that she could use both of her hands. “Alright, I’m gonna give you some pointers that you can use for any FPS!”

She was awful at first. No aim, and Seven had to keep reviving her. But after a little practice of the basics, she finally managed to take down a few enemies by herself. It was even beginning to be fun!

So fun, in fact, that she jumped at the sound of a knock on her door. A quick glance at the clock confirmed that it was around the time that she told Moira she could come over. 

“Ack! I’m so sorry Seven! Yuni’s here and I have to go!”

“Hehe, no problem! We can play more the next time I slack off, OK?”

“Yup! And, Seven… make sure to eat more than just Honey Buddha Chips!” There! She had spoken her mind. 

“But they’re the only meal I need!”

Moira’s knocks became more insistent. “Ugh, I really have to go now. But please at least try to eat something else! I’ll talk to you later!”

“See ya! I’ll send you the name of the FPS in a bit!”

“Thanks! Bye!”

Mi-na hung up and sprinted over to the door to open it. Moira was bringing up her fist to knock again, but seemed pleased to see Mi-na.

“Finally! I thought you might have changed your mind!” Moira said.

“So sorry Yuni, I was talking to Seven and I lost track of the time and—”

Moira cut her off by tackling her with a hug. “I don’t care, I’m just happy to hang out with my friend! If you’re ready, then let’s go!”

Per Moira’s request, they walked to the arcade that Mi-na had looked up the directions to. As they passed by a jewelry shop, Mi-na turned to look at Moira who was spouting off some random fact about baking that she had learned that morning.

“Sorry to interrupt, but why did you say that Liana was ‘being mean’ earlier?”

An uncharacteristic frown crossed Moira’s face. “I was bored and asked her to go somewhere with me. But she said that she was busy with the RFA, and told me to either go bake or do something useful. She hasn’t even apologized!”

Mi-na frowned as well. She was hoping that a vacation would allow Juliana to relax, but apparently joining the RFA did not allow for that. If only she hadn’t answered that Unknown person. But then she wouldn’t have gotten to meet the RFA members.

“Well, did you ask Sydnee or Kazi to come with us?”

“Sydnee’s doing stuff for the musical she’s in, and Kazi told me that she has too much school work to do!”

“What? But she’s always working! She told me that she would try to hang out with all of us, especially since you and Liana are only here for a month!” Though, she did get a text from Yoosung in the middle of the night, talking about a guest that Kazumi suggested they invite. Maybe she was up too late and slept in or something. 

“Exactly! I really wanted to go over to the university and take her with me to the apartment. But she probably would have just called the police on me.”

“Uh, yeah…” Mi-na didn’t really know how to respond to that. But she was upset that Kazumi couldn’t seem to make the time to hang out with her friends, even for an hour or two. Was it work for the RFA that was the problem? Or did Kazumi just not want to spend time with them?

“So Mi-na, tell me about that game Seven suggested that we play!”

Mi-na shook her head to remove thoughts of Kazumi. She’d just talk to her later and get her to come hang out. For now… Mi-na smiled at Moira. “I think we’ll have fun playing this one.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep trying to upload in the first week of each two months, but that doesn't seem to be working out. So instead, I think I'll just try to upload on the 8th every two months now. Look out for Chapter 6 in August!


	7. Chapter 6

Sydnee stood up and stretched her arms as she let out a large yawn. After her workout, she was feeling exhausted. Hopefully she could get a good night’s sleep and wake up feeling energized. After all, she might get to go running with Zen again!

Checking the time on her phone, Sydnee saw that it was almost 12:30 AM. She had spent her whole day working out, practicing her lines, and answering emails for the RFA party. Sydnee felt a little guilty for turning Moira down earlier that day, but she could make up for it by spending time with her later. 

She started to turn her phone off to get ready to sleep, but a notification came in from the RFA messenger about an open chatroom. Sydnee was curious to see who was online at this hour, so she clicked on the chatroom.

Sydnee’s heart thudded in her chest. Was he regretting going for a run with her? Would he rather run alone, or… with someone else?

Sydnee sighed as she collapsed onto her bed, finally turning off her phone. She couldn’t help but feel a pang of disappointment when she realized that she and Zen might not be able to go running together for awhile.

“Ah, it’s fine. I’ll see him during rehearsals. I think,” she muttered to herself.

If she wanted to be ready for tomorrow, then she needed to sleep. With this thought at the front of her mind, Sydnee closed her eyes and let her exhaustion drag her consciousness away.

✧✧✧

Moira frowned at the screen for the nth time as she read the messages again. If Jaehee was stuck babysitting Elizabeth, then she wouldn’t get to see her at all today! And it wasn’t as if Jaehee could just take Elizabeth out of the office with her. Jumin would probably be mad if she did that.

“UGHHHH, how am I supposed to hang out with Jaehee if she’s stuck in her office! I kinda wanna see Elizabeth too…”

Using the door that connected their hotel rooms, Moira barged into Juliana’s room to ask for her help. She found the red-head sitting at her desk, answering emails for the RFA on her computer.

“Liana!!! I have a problem!!!” she yelled to get her attention.

Juliana winced, still staring at her computer screen. “Seriously, lower your voice. You’re going to disturb the people in the other rooms.”

“Aww, are you still grumpy like you were yesterday?”

Juliana let out a sigh, then finally turned her head to look at Moira. “About that. I apologize for snapping at you. I’m not taking back what I said, but I could’ve phrased it in a nicer way.”

Moira pretended to be upset, giving Juliana a pout. She couldn’t keep it up for long, however. The truth was, she had already gotten over it. Plus, her question about how to see Jaehee was far more important. “Ok, I’ll accept your apology! Now, help me with my problem! Please?”

“What’s the problem?”

“Jaehee has to look after Elizabeth the 3rd today, so she can’t hang out with me!!” Moira wailed.

“She what?” Juliana looked annoyed to hear this. “Jumin must have forced her to babysit the cat. What a jerk.”

“That’s not the point! I need to know how I can hang out with her today!”

“I’m sorry Moira, but short of barging into her office, I don’t think you can see Jaehee today.”

Suddenly a light bulb went off in Moira’s head. Of course, she could do that! If Jaehee couldn’t come to Moira, then Moira would just have to go to her! She opened her mouth to thank Juliana for the idea, but then stopped. Juliana would probably try to dissuade her from interrupting Jaehee while she was working. So instead, Moira tried to look as dejected as possible. 

“Fine… I’ll try to think of something else to do,” she said, throwing her shoulders forward into a hunch to seem even more let down. 

Juliana shot her a look full of suspicion. “Do not barge into Jaehee’s office. I’m sure she has work to do.”

“Okay, okay, I won’t.”

Softening her face, Juliana stood up and put a hand on Moira’s shoulder. “I’m sure Jaehee will be free tomorrow. In the meantime, maybe you can bake something for her.”

“Yeah, I’ll do that. See you later Liana!” Moira hurried out of the room before Juliana could guess that she lied about not going to Jaehee’s office. As soon as she was out of Juliana’s sight she called for a taxi to take her to the C&R building. Moira would get to see both Jaehee and Elizabeth today! She’d make sure of it!

Unfortunately she forgot that only employees or those with appointments could go further than the lobby. How on earth was she supposed to get all the way to Jaehee’s office? Maybe Jumin could make an exception if she asked?

As she pulled out her phone to open the RFA app, an idea came to her. The CEO-in-line and his assistant were both in the RFA, so surely other people in the company would know about it. All Moira would have to do is show the security guards the app so that they’d know that she was a part of the RFA! Then she could pretend that she was going to see Jaehee for RFA matters!

Confident in her plan, Moira strode up to the security guards and held out her phone to face them. “My name is Moira Ness, one of the party planners for the RFA, and I have urgent business with Assistant Jaehee Kang!”

The security guards glanced at each other. One of them bent forward to take a closer look at the phone. “It looks like the real app,” the security guard said. “Mr. Han even posted pictures of his cat in the chatroom over there. But…”

“This is an urgent matter! I need you to direct me to Jae— er, Assistant Kang’s office, right now! Mr. Han wouldn’t want me to keep her waiting when she could be working!” Moira said, trying to sound authoritative.

The guards glanced at each other again, looking doubtful. In the end one of them escorted her to Jaehee’s office so that they could ask Jaehee if her claims of being an RFA member were legit. 

Moira was afraid that Jaehee would get the security guard to send her back, but she had to at least try. When they arrived at Jaehee’s office, she saw Elizabeth the 3rd sitting on top of a stack of papers on Jaehee’s desk. Jaehee was trying to prod the cat off of them to no avail.

“Erm, Ms. Kang?” the security guard said, as Moira shouted, “Jaehee!”

Jaehee looked up in surprise. “M-moira? What are you doing here?”

“She said that she was a part of the RFA and that she had urgent business with you,” the guard said. 

“Well, yes, she is a part of the RFA, but… Um, thank you for taking her to me.” The security guard nodded and walked back the way they had come. Jaehee sighed and turned back towards Moira, who was trying to approach Elizabeth. “Why did you come all the way here?” she asked.

“I wanted to see you, but you have to take care of Elizabeth. So instead of you coming to meet me, I came to meet you!”

Jaehee frowned. “You don’t even have a real appointment with me, though,” she pointed out.

“Well, I am an RFA member! And right now, spending time with you will give me the inspiration that I need to make the party a smashing success!” Moira tried picking up Elizabeth to get her off of the desk, but Elizabeth ended up struggling out of her arms and leaping off of the desk, scattering the papers that were on it everywhere.

Moira let out a little ‘oops’ and bent down to help Jaehee, who was already collecting the documents from the floor. “I know you mean well, Moira,” said Jaehee as they picked up the papers, “but I really need to focus on my work. And I have to take care of Elizabeth the 3rd on top of that, so I can’t talk with you, or whatever you were expecting.”

“Oh, well…” Moira scrambled for a solution as they finished putting the papers back on the desk. “I can… look after Elizabeth for you! Then you can talk to me whenever you take your break!”

“But… Mr. Han told me to—”

“If he gets mad, you can just tell him that I barged in here without asking and wouldn’t leave!”

“Well, that is what you did after all,” Jaehee said, giving Moira a small smile. “I probably won’t be able to change your mind, so you may look after Elizabeth. But you can’t disturb me while I’m working, okay?”

“Hooray!” Moira pulled Jaehee into a hug. “Don’t worry, neither me nor Elizabeth will disturb you!”

Jaehee stiffened at the sudden contact, but relaxed into a little and gave Moira’s back a small pat. Moira let her go, then turned to Elizabeth, who seemed poised to jump up on the desk again. 

“Come now Elizabeth! Or, no… I’ll call you Lizzy! Lizzy, our important mission today is to not disturb Jaehee!”

It wasn’t exactly what she wanted, but Jaehee would have to get up from her work to take a break sooner or later. Then they’d have fun talking about all sorts of things! So, it looked like her plan had been a success!

✧✧✧

Juliana let out a frustrated groan. She tells Moira not to disturb Jaehee while she was working, and what does she do? Exactly what she was told not to!

Still so insensitive. At least he was being useful when it came to the party.

On a sudden impulse, Juliana looked up ways to keep a cat entertained when they are home alone. If Jumin could find a way that worked, he shouldn’t feel the need to take Elizabeth to work. Surely Elizabeth would be interested in at least one of the various things the internet could come up with. Juilana drafted a list of a few things, including placing cardboard boxes, paper bags, and interactive cat toys down for Elizabeth. There, the next time she had Jumin’s attention she’d send them to him. Then maybe Jaehee’s workload could decrease, even if it was for a little bit. 

Satisfied with her plan, Juliana was about to return to working on the party, when another text popped up, this time from Mi-na. It seemed that Mi-na was trying to get everyone to come to a park to hang out. Juliana considered refusing, but as she was technically on vacation she should allow herself time to relax as she meant to do. So Juliana texted Mi-na back, saying that she’d be there.

Juliana looked back up at her laptop and the unfinished email she had been writing before she was interrupted. It would do her good to go outside with her friends. After all, she was only a party planner. The RFA could do without her trying to micromanage everything for a few hours. Hopefully.

✧✧✧

Mi-na did a little dance when she saw Juliana’s reply. She would be coming to the park! That was one down, three more to go! 

Well, actually, two more to go. To her surprise and disappointment, Moira had declined, saying that she was trying to spend time with Jaehee at C&R. Mi-na was surprised at how quickly Moira seemed to get attached to Jaehee, but if she could relieve Jaehee’s stress in any way it would be a good thing. Plus, she had seen Moira the day before, so it wasn’t too big of a deal. 

That left Sydnee and Kazumi. Mi-na quickly sent a text to Sydnee, then hovered her thumb over Kazumi’s contact. Kazumi rarely seemed to look at her phone except in the middle of the night, so if she sent Kazumi a text, she might not get it. To make sure she actually got the message, Mi-na decided to call.

She paced around the apartment as the phone rang. After a few rings, Kazumi finally picked up. “Mi-na? What’s up?”

“Hey Kazi! I just wanted to know if you were free today.”

The sigh Kazumi let out filled Mi-na with a sense of foreboding. “Sorry Mi-na, I’ve got to study for my next test.”

“The Art History one? Didn’t you already study for that?”

“I have to make sure I know the material well enough.”

“I’m sure you already do! Plus, it’ll just be for an hour or two!”

“I’m sorry.”

Mi-na bit her lip. “Kazi… why don’t you want to hang out with us? Surely it can’t just be because of school.”

“Hey, I did hang out with everyone.”

“Yeah, once!” Mi-na stamped her foot on the floor. “Yuni and Liana are only here for a month, you know. We’d like to see you in person more than once before they go.”

“I’ll have to see if I have time.”

“You mean you’ll have to see if you feel like it,” Mi-na muttered darkly.

“Listen, you can complain about it all you want, but the fact of the matter is I won’t be able to spend time with everyone today. This conversation is going nowhere and is using up my time to study. So I gotta go.” When Mi-na didn’t answer, Kazumi let out a frustrated sigh. “I promise I’ll try to do something with you later, okay? See you.” She hung up and Mi-na was left listening to the dial tone.

Tears of frustration pricked her eyes. All she wanted to do was spend time with all of her friends, but Kazumi refused to cooperate. Then again, she shouldn’t have snapped at her. Maybe if she had been a little more understanding about Kazumi’s need to get her schoolwork done, then Kazumi might have decided to come with them to the park. 

It was too late for that now. All she could do was check to see if Sydnee had agreed to go. If she declined, then it would just be Mi-na and Juliana once again.

Luckily, Sydnee sent a message saying that she’d be there, if a little late because of her first rehearsal. Mi-na’s spirits lifted a little. At least two of her friends would be joining her. 

Hopefully the next time she talked to Kazumi she’d be a little more open to putting down her school work for a day.

✧✧✧

“Sooooo, are you finished yet?” Moira couldn’t help the impatience that spilled over as she watched Jaehee work at her desk. She really wanted to talk with her right now!

“No, I still have a little bit more to go on this part.” 

“C’mon Jaehee! Take a small break! The work will be there when you get back!” Moira looked around the room until she spotted Elizabeth. Picking her up, she stood with the cat in front of Jaehee’s desk. “See? Even Lizzy wants you to take a break!”

“She just looks uncomfortable to me,” said Jaehee, a doubtful look on her face.

“Nah, she’s frowning because you’re working too much!”

“Sure.” Jaehee turned back to face her work. “Moira, I know you mean well, but I really need to finish this. After I do, I promise that I’ll take a short break.”

“Really? Yay!” Moira bounced around, jostling Elizabeth enough to make her leap out of her arms and onto Jaehee’s desk. Papers flew everywhere for the second time, and Jaehee’s forehead creased into a frown. Moira threw her a sheepish smile and helped her collect the papers again. “Maybe I should take Lizzy for a walk around the building,” she said once all of the papers had been collected.

“I don’t think Mr. Han will have any objections as long as you stay inside.”

“Cool! We’ll be back later!” With that, Moira scooped Elizabeth back up into her arms and skipped out of the office. Elizabeth started to struggle almost immediately, so she was forced to put her down. Fortunately, the cat seemed willing to follow her around as she walked from room to room. 

There wasn’t much to see inside the building besides the break room area, a small cafeteria, and more offices. Many of the employees and security guards looked as if they wanted to say something to her, but they saw Elizabeth trailing after her and reluctantly let her roam around.

The sight outside of the break room window was the best part of their little trip. Moira could see over the tops of some of the smaller buildings, and the cars below looked like toys. Elizabeth seemed to be fascinated by the window too, as she sat down next to Moira to stare out of it. Neither of them noticed the dark-haired man that walked up to stand beside them.

Moira turned to look when Elizabeth let out a meow. The man had knelt down and was petting her, seeming to check her for something as he did. 

“Oh, hi! I didn’t see you there!” Moira said as a way of greeting the man. He continued to pet Elizabeth for a second longer, then stood up to face her.

“You must be Moira. I see you’ve been watching Elizabeth the 3rd for my assistant,” he said.

For his assistant? Oh, he probably means Jaehee! Which means he is… “Jumin Han! Nice to meet you in person!” She stuck her hand out for a handshake which Jumin accepted with a bit of hesitation. 

“A pleasure to meet you as well. Has Elizabeth been well?”

“Mhm! She really likes looking out of the windows! And chasing strings.” Moira pulled out the piece of loose string that she had used to play with Elizabeth earlier. “Here, I’ll show you!”

“You don’t have to—”

It was too late. Moira had gotten Elizabeth’s attention and was getting her to run after the string as she dragged it along the floor. Walking backwards so that she could keep Elizabeth in sight, she didn’t notice that she was approaching the doorway of the break room until she bumped into something solid. Two exclamations sounded out, almost simultaneously. 

Moira glanced over her shoulder to see two C&R employees, now with coffee stained shirts. One of them had been carrying papers that were also now stained with coffee. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry!” Moira apologized. 

The employees scowled at her, their expressions turning to nervousness when Jumin walked up behind her. He also apologized for her, telling the employees where they could borrow new shirts and giving the one with the papers time to reprint them. Jaehee stepped into the break room as well, having heard the commotion. After realizing what had happened, she also apologized to the employees. 

Moira’s face burned. She had come to chat with Jaehee, and maybe help her a bit, not to cause trouble! After the two employees left, she turned to Jumin and Jaehee. “I’m really sorry! I just wanted to show Jumin how LIzzy likes to play with string!” she apologized as sincerely as she could.

“Lizzy? Her name is Elizabeth the 3rd,” Jumin corrected. “As for what just happened… maybe it would be better if you and Elizabeth the 3rd stayed in Jaehee’s office.”

“Good idea, Mr. Han.” Jaehee gave him a bow, then started to usher Moira and Elizabeth back to her office.

“Make sure to feed her at the time I gave you,” Jumin called out to them.

Jaehee nodded towards him, then he went out of view as they turned the corner.

“I really didn’t mean to cause any trouble,” Moira said as they walked down the hall.

“I know.”

“Um, so, did you finish your work?”

“For the moment, yes. I was just coming to find you.” Jaehee sighed. “I have to admit, I’m disappointed that you won’t be able to take Elizabeth out of my office anymore. It was really nice without her hair flying around.”

“Yeah, she sheds enough to make a wig for Zen’s hair!” Moira joked.

Jaehee blinked at her, then let out a laugh. “I never thought of that before. I guess it is the same color.”

“Mhm!”

They arrived at Jaehee’s office, and Elizabeth wasted no time in making herself at home on Jaehee’s desk. Jaehee frowned at her, but her mind seemed to be on other things.

“Speaking of Zen, I’m worried about him,” Jaehee said. “He was really looking forward to his role. I hope he doesn’t lose it because of his ankle.”

“I’m sure Zen will be fine! After all, they wouldn’t want to give his role away since he’s so popular!”

“That’s true.”

“Now!” Moira clapped her hands together and pulled together the two chairs in Jaehee’s office. “While you’re taking your break, let’s talk about my bake sale for the RFA! I was thinking of adding in some motifs for all of the RFA members, so tell me about the kind of coffee you like!”

“The kind of coffee I like?” Jaehee asked, a surprised look on her face.

“Well, yeah. I want to serve coffee with the baked goods. Kinda like a mini cafe, you know?”

Jaehee smiled and sank into her chair. “Yes, coffee with the baked goods sounds wonderful.” She looked at Moira, who had sat down in the other chair. “I’ll have to make it quick, since I do have to get back to work. But I’ll tell you what I like about coffee.”

✧✧✧

Kazumi tried to stifle her incessant yawning, but she failed miserably. Her stomach’s complaints did not help to improve her mood. It was the only reason that she stopped studying for the moment to see what the cafe on the first floor of the library had to offer that day.

As she walked over to the cafe area, she spotted a familiar blond head weaving its way through the students assembled there.

“Oh, Yoosung.” Kazumi walked over to stand next to him. “What brings you here?”

“Kazumi!” Yoosung turned to face her, giving her a bright smile. “Ooh, I meant to tell you earlier, but there’s a raid going on in LOLOL tonight, and it’s the perfect chance for you to level up! So, do you want to join me later?”

Kazumi shrugged. “I’ve got a test tomorrow, so I don’t know how long I’ll be up. But if I can’t sleep, I’ll join you.” She spied a textbook under one of his arms and raised an eyebrow at him. “Did you come here to study too?”

Yoosung let out a sheepish laugh. “Erm, well, I was going to, but… I decided to just get some food and go back to my dorm instead.”

“Of course you did. So, do you have a test tomorrow or…?”

“Yeah… for my first class.”

“Hah… Seriously, even if you don’t want to be a vet anymore, you could at least study for the classes your scholarship is paying for,” Kazumi reprimanded. “Or talk to your academics counselor and switch your major. Stop procrastinating.” She hesitated a moment before adding, “I have a study room reserved for about another half an hour. You should come study.”

“Really? You wouldn’t mind if I studied with you?” Yoosung asked.

“As long as you don’t mess around, it’s fine. Plus, I’d rather you disturb me than fail another test.”

“Hey, I don’t fail all of my tests!” Yoosung pouted, trying to seem annoyed, but ended up smiling anyway. “Thanks for caring though, Kazumi.”

Kazumi nodded. “C’mon, let’s get something to eat and then head to the study room.”

After they had grabbed their food, Kazumi showed him where the study room was. She immediately sat down and cracked open her notes, determined to get as much studying done as she could. Yoosung, on the other hand, pulled out his phone and began scrolling through it. 

“Ooh, look at this! New heroes are being put on the free rotation! I really think you’ll like this one, they suit your play style!” Yoosung said, turning his phone towards her. Kazumi gave him an exasperated glare, making him apologize and pull out his notes.A few minutes went by before Yoosung lost focus once again.

“So, what are you studying for?”

“Can’t you go ten minutes without being distracted?”

Yoosung shot her a sheepish smile. “Sorry, I just can’t focus. This subject’s kinda difficult to understand.”

“What is it?”

“Organic chemistry.”

“Oh. Sorry, I can’t help you there.”

“Don’t worry about it.” He lowered his head to rest on his hand as he stared at his notes. “It’s just hard to care when I don’t even know what I’m doing all of this for.”

Kazumi glanced up from her notes to look at him. “Well, um… what did you originally want to become a vet for?”

“Well…” He paused for such a long time that Kazumi began to wonder if she had crossed a line somewhere. 

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“No, it’s okay. It’s just been so long since I’ve thought about it.” Yoosung let out a breath. “I wanted to become a vet because of… well, because of Rika. She had a dog, Sally, who died. Rika thought that she was at fault because she didn’t get Sally treatment for her eyes. So I told her that I’d become a vet, so that I could make sure that all pets got what they needed, so that their owners wouldn’t be sad. But now… I don’t know. Would Rika still want me to become a vet even though she’s…” His eyebrows pinched together and his mouth tightened, as if he might cry. 

Kazumi didn’t know what to say. She wanted to be annoyed with him for wasting his scholarship like he was, but… he just seemed lost and in pain. 

Yoosung lifted his eyes from his notes to meet hers. His expression seemed less pained now, but his eyes still held a great deal of uncertainty. She fidgeted as they just started at each other for a moment. Should she be saying something comforting?

“Do you think I should still try to become a vet?” he suddenly blurted out. 

“I, uh… I mean, do you like animals?”

“Well, yeah, I do. And I don’t want anything like what happened to Sally to happen to someone else’s pet. But still… I’m sure there are plenty of other people that can help the pets.”

“Yes, but do YOU want to be one of those people?”

“Do you think I should?”

Kazumi sighed. “I can’t tell you what you should do with your life, Yoosung. That’s something you have to figure out on your own.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to put this on you.” Yoosung sat up and ran a hand through his hair. “It just feels weird not having Rika tell me what I should do. Though, you’re pretty good at that yourself!” he added, turning his gaze back towards her. “After all, you got me to agree to study!”

“Yes, study. Something we haven’t even started yet,” she remarked, raising her eyebrows at him.

“Oh, sorry! I promise, I’ll actually let you study. But first… Can we take a selfie together? If only to prove to people that I can actually study.”

Kazumi rolled her eyes, but smiled at him. “Yeah, yeah, hurry up.”

They posed for the selfie, with Kazumi propping up Yoosung’s textbook for the evidence of his studying. Then they finally did study, each going to look over their notes. However, this time Kazumi was the one who couldn’t focus. She couldn’t help but go over the conversation with Yoosung in her mind, wishing that she could have said something that would set him on the right track. Unfortunately, the only one who could know what he should do was Yoosung himself. 

Kazumi shook her head. There was no time for her to be getting distracted like this. She needed to get to studying. After all, Mi-na would be disappointed to find that she didn’t study like she said she would.

✧✧✧

“So, even though Zen couldn’t make it to the rehearsal, it went surprisingly well. We actually were able to…” Sydnee was recounting the day’s rehearsal to Mi-na and Juliana as they strolled around the park. Much to her dismay, they didn’t seem to be paying that much attention. In fact, she didn’t think they were paying attention at all.

“Hello? Anyone home?” she asked loudly, waving a hand in front of Juliana’s face. 

Juliana scowled at her. “You derailed my train of thought. It will take me forever to get back to what I was thinking about.”

“Well, I am sooo sorry. But I’m pretty sure the point of meeting up wasn’t to ignore each other,” Sydnee said, pouting at her. 

“Sorry Sydnee, I should’ve been listening,” Mi-na said. “I was just thinking about Kazi, to be honest.”

“Did something happen?” Juliana asked.

“We… kinda had a fight. She refused to come hang out with us, saying that she had to study, and I… got upset.” Mi-na looked away from them, down at the ground.

“Well, you know how Kazumi is. She’d want to make sure that she knew the material forwards, backwards, and upside down. Plus,” Juliana added, “I’m sure she knows that you were only angry because you wanted to see her.”

“Yeah, you guys will be back to being buddy-buddy in no time!”

Mi-na gave them a small smile, seeming much more relaxed. 

“Now!” Sydnee clapped her hands together. “Since you two have come back down to earth, I will finish my story!”

“Don’t you want to know what I was thinking about?” Juliana asked.

“You said that you lost your train of thought! Didn’t you forget what you were thinking about?”

“I just remembered.”

“Oh, whatever. My story is probably more interesting anyway!”

Juliana rolled her eyes, but didn’t comment further. Sydnee took this as a sign to continue telling them about the rehearsal, which she did. This time Mi-na and Juliana listened attentively.

“I feel bad for Zen, but I’m glad that your rehearsal went well!” Mi-na said. 

“Well I don’t. Feel bad for Zen, I mean,” Juliana clarified. “He shouldn’t have let something as trivial as Jumin’s opinion get him so riled up.”

“Trivial, huh?” Sydnee smirked. “Well, if his opinion is so trivial, then why bother arguing with him, Liana?”

“It’s none of your business.”

“Mhm, okay~”

“Speaking of Jumin, have you two seen the pictures of his cat?” Mi-na asked, trying to change the subject. 

“Elizabeth the 3rd? Trust me, I’ve seen quite a bit of her,” Juliana remarked.

“Oh yeah! Did Seven ask you to send him the pictures? I want to see them too!” Sydnee exclaimed.

Mi-na smiled and took out her phone, navigating to her chat history with Jumin. “Here they are!”

Sydnee squealed and took the phone from Mi-na’s hand. Elizabeth was so cute in all of the pictures! Juliana tried to act disinterested, but eventually she peeked over Sydnee’s shoulder to look at the pictures.

“She is a cute cat. I think that Jumin obsesses over her too much, though,” Juliana said. 

“Well, yeah. But who wouldn’t obsess over this cutie?” Sydnee asked. 

Juliana raised an eyebrow at her. “Would you take your cat to rehearsals the same way Jumin takes his cat to work?”

“Well…”

Juliana gave her a smug smile, as if she expected that Sydnee would have no answer for her. Sydnee rolled her eyes and looked back at the phone. Jumin could be a bit weird, but his cat was adorable!

As she was fawning over the photos, her stomach let out a small growl. “Hey, is anyone feeling hungry?” she asked.

“Don’t worry Mi-na, I’ll translate for you,” Juliana said. “She means, ‘Is anyone up for buying me dinner today?’”

“Hey!”

“Well…” Mi-na started thoughtfully into the distance. “I’m sure there’s a restaurant somewhere nearby that we can go to.” She turned towards Sydnee and reached out a hand for her phone. Sydnee gave it back, and after a minute or two of searching, Mi-na had found the restaurant and the bus route that would take them there.

“Well, there you go, Sydnee. Free dinner, courtesy of your friends,” said Juliana.

“Thank you!” Sydnee flashed Juliana her brightest smile. Juliana could only huff in annoyance and follow Mi-na as she headed towards the bus stop.

Sydnee made to follow Mi-na as well when she heard a quiet “excuse me” come from behind her. She turned to see a man with white hair that was pink at the tips fidgeting from one foot to the other. His eyes widened when he saw that he had her attention.

“Uh, were you talking to me?” Sydnee asked him.

“Oh, uh, yes.” The man rubbed the nape of his neck and looked down at the ground. “This will sound kinda awkward, but… My friend wanted me to help him out at the theater today, and while I was there I heard the actors going through the rehearsal…” He glanced up at her shyly. “You sounded really good, even though you were just reading through the script.”

Sydnee was shocked. She didn’t expect someone to have noticed her talent so fast. “Well, thank you! I appreciate the compliment! But… How did you find me here?

“Oh! I didn’t follow you if that’s what you were thinking,” he said hastily. “I was just taking a walk when I thought that I heard the voice from earlier. When I looked over, I saw that it was you. Sorry for making you uncomfortable.”

“No, I’m not uncomfortable. I just didn’t expect to have a fan so soon!”

“Well, of course! You did great and—”

“Sydnee, hurry up! We’re doing this for you, after all!” Juliana called. Sydnee looked behind her to see that her friends were halfway to the bus stop. Turning back to the man, she gave him a sheepish smile. “Sorry, I gotta go now. Again, thanks for the compliment!”

“You’re welcome. And um, I guess I’ll see you again if I stop by the theater.”

“Yup! Feel free to say hi if you see me!” Sydnee waved at him, then skipped over to her friends.

“Was that guy flirting with you?” Mi-na asked, curious.

“Nope! I just have a new fan!” Sydnee crowed, sticking her nose into the air.

“Already? How did he even see your acting?”

“He said he was helping a friend out at the theater earlier.”

Juliana frowned. “I thought only people directly involved with the musical were supposed to be there.”

“He was probably on a clean up crew or something,” Mi-na said. “Either way, I’m happy for you, Sydnee!”

Sydnee gave her a smile, but couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy concerning what Juliana said. It was weird that he was let into the theater. Unfortunately, the insistent rumbling of her stomach derailed her train of thought.

It seemed that food would have to come before any mystery solving.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What? I actually updated when I said I would? Must be a miracle.   
> Next update is October 8th. (I hope.)


	8. Chapter 7

“Just half an hour, I promise!”

“I don’t know Moira, I’m quite busy today…”

“C’mon! You know I’ll just keep bugging you until you agree!”

Jaehee sighed on the other end of the line, letting Moira know that she was giving in. “Fine, I will meet you at Temuki in ten minutes. But I really can’t stay any longer than half an hour, okay?” she warned.

“Yippee!” Moira did a little dance before adding, “See you there!” and hanging up. She waltzed over to Juliana’s room to tell her the good news, but surprisingly, she wasn’t there. Usually she would be at the desk working on something. Maybe she went out for some fresh air?

Well, that didn’t matter. Jaehee had accepted her invitation to go to Temuki! Which meant that she needed to get there fast, so she could spend as much time with Jaehee as possible!

It took less than ten minutes for Moira to show up at Temuki, with Jaehee arriving soon after. Moira waved excitedly as she saw Jaehee round the corner to get her attention. Catching sight of her, Jaehee smiled and waved back before approaching her.

Moira started to meet Jaehee halfway when she felt someone lightly punch her shoulder.

“Hey, didn’t expect to see you here this morning!” Sydnee was behind her, a wide grin on her face.

“Sydnee!!!” Moira started to pull her into a big hug, but stopped halfway when she saw that Jaehee had reached them. She stepped back to allow Jaehee and Sydnee to face each other, then started her introductions. “Sydnee, this is Jaehee from the RFA! Jaehee, this is Sydnee!”

“You’re the actress, right?” Jaehee asked.

“Yup!” Sydnee smiled, clearly pleased that she remembered. “I was going to Temuki to get coffee before my rehearsal today. What about you two?”

“I convinced her to come with me to Temuki!” Moira declared proudly. “But she said that she could only stay for 30 minutes, so we should probably go inside.”

“Yes, we should,” Jaehee agreed. 

“Hey, don’t let me keep you two!” Sydnee said, walking up and opening the door to Temuki for them. “But… Do you mind if I join? I still have some time to kill before the rehearsal starts.”

Moira glanced at Jaehee, who simply nodded. “I don’t have a problem with that.” She then headed through the door into Temuki.

Sydnee looked back at Moira and smiled. “Hehe, looks like I’m crashing your date, Yuni.”

“It’s not a date! If it were a date, I would make sure it was longer than 30 minutes!”

Sydnee raised an eyebrow at her, but then shook her head. “Yeah, okay. Hurry up and go in. My arm hurts from holding the door.”

Moira stuck her tongue out at Sydnee’s obvious disbelief, but obliged her and went into the cafe. Once she went in, she found another familiar face standing at the counter, waiting on her own order.

“Hey, Liana! Fancy seeing you here,” Sydnee called out from behind her.

Juliana turned her head towards them, eyebrows raised in inquiry. Spotting her and Sydnee, she started to make her way over to them. Jaehee also joined them from where she had been waiting for them at the door. 

“I didn’t expect to see you two this morning,” Juliana said. “And this is…?” she asked, motioning to Jaehee.

“Jaehee Kang. I believe we know each other from the RFA?”

“Oh, yes. I’m Juliana. Nice to meet you, Jaehee.”

As they exchanged greetings, Moira couldn’t help but feel her excitement bubble up. Not only would she be able to spend time with Jaehee, but with Sydnee and maybe Juliana joining them, they could all talk and get to know each other better!

“Ooh, Liana, Liana, Liana!” she cut in. “You should join us! Me, Jaehee, and Sydnee are going to be in Temuki for a little bit!”

“I only stopped by for a cup of coffee before I checked out the party’s venue. I really don’t think I should stay to chat,” Juliana said, face pulling into a frown. 

“Oh, c’mon Liana!” Sydnee butted in. “The party venue is not going to fly away. Check it after hanging out with us!”

With the persistence of both Sydnee and Moira, Juliana was almost forced to stay. Jaehee shot her a sympathetic look, but Moira liked to imagine that Jaehee was happy to get to know more of the new members of the RFA.

“Mhm, Kazi and Mi-na were right! The coffee in this place is delicious!” Sydnee said as they sat down at a table.

“It is really nice,” Jaehee agreed.

“I don’t usually drink coffee, but this really is amazing!” Moira added.

“That’s because most of your drink might as well be pure sugar,” Juliana said, glaring at Moira’s cup. 

The other three laughed. Moira’s drink was quite diabetes inducing, but, as someone who loved sweets, that was normal for her.

“So, Jaehee, how does it feel being the only RFA member who’s met three of the new members?” Sydnee asked, flashing her a wide grin. 

“I’m glad I’ve had the chance to do so. I’ll admit, I was wary of you all at first, but having more girls in the RFA is really nice.”

“Hm, I suppose it would be. Now that I think about it, most of the RFA members are guys,” Juliana said. 

“Well, I’m glad we can add some more feminine charm to the mix!” Sydnee said. “Buuut, be honest. Has Yuni been getting on your nerves?”

“Hey! I have not! Right, Jaehee?”

Jaehee gave Moira a sheepish smile. “Most of the time, no.”

“Only most of the time?” Juliana asked. Seeing Moira frown at her, she added, “Don’t make such a face, Moira. I’m sure you annoy most people.” A small, teasing smile spread on her face.

Moira’s pout only deepened. She was not an annoyance! The only reason why she wanted to hang out with Jaehee so much was becaused Jaehee needed some breaks from her work! And, well, she also enjoyed her company. A lot.

While she was caught up in her thoughts, Jaehee had steered the conversation towards Sydnee’s new job. “So, I’ve heard that you and Zen are in the same musical?”

“Yup, we are! Zen can’t make it to the rehearsals right now because of his ankle, but I’m sure I’ll share the stage with him soon!”

“Yes, I hope he gets better soon… But you know not to divulge any personal information of his that he posts in the chatroom, correct?” Jaehee asked.

Sydnee looked taken aback. “Of course I know that! I’m not that rude.” She frowned at Jaehee. “I thought you were starting to trust us a bit more.”

“Well, it has been only about… what? Six or seven days since we entered Rika’s apartment, led by the information some hacker gave us? It’s a miracle we’re trusted at all,” Juliana stated.

“It doesn’t help that you act like you control the RFA. I mean, weren’t you going to check out the party’s venue? Why do you need to do that?” Sydnee asked, rolling her eyes.

“Yes about that… Juliana, there really is no need for you to oversee everything. I assure you that Mr. Han and I have everything under control,” Jaehee said.

“I know that. But how am I expected to invite guests to a party if I cannot tell them where it is located or how they should dress? It doesn’t make sense.” Juliana took a sip of her coffee, looking ready to end the topic there. 

“Sorry, I guess I haven’t really been helpful lately,” Moira said, looking sheepishly at Juliana.

“I disagree, Moira. Taking a break and spending time with you has been really fun,” Jaehee replied. “Just, not in my office. You have a habit of displacing things.”

Moira and Jaehee shared a laugh over that. It really was nice to see Jaehee looking less stressed. Maybe next time she could get Jaehee to take a longer break! Then they could talk half the day away, and Jaehee’s golden brown eyes would light up as she— 

Moira realized that she was staring into Jaehee’s eyes and her face turned red. “Ehehe, sorry, my thoughts kinda wandered there.”

“Oh ho?” Sydnee said with a smirk. “I wonder where they were wandering to.”   


Moira stuck her tongue out at Sydnee, while Juliana merely rolled her eyes, muttering “childish” under her breath.

“Anyway, speaking of party guests.” Sydnee took a sip of her coffee and continued, “You all will be some of the first to know that I will invite the most guests to the party!”

“Mhm, sure you will,” Juliana said skeptically.

“Is that a challenge?”

“No, it’s called doubt.”

“I believe in you, Sydnee!” Moira cheered.

“Thank you, Yuni!” Sydnee flashed a peace sign and a smile at her. “I already have two guests that I’m emailing, so I’m off to a great start!”

“Yeah, well so do I,” Juliana resorted.

“Oh, and you said you weren’t challenging me!”

“I’m not. I am just letting you know how inflated your self-importance is.”

“Well, if we’re gonna have a competition, let’s invite more guests!” Moira exclaimed, pumping a fist into the air.

“This is NOT a competition!” Juliana protested in vain.

“Hm, people to invite…” Jaehee thought for a minute before her eyes lit up with an idea. “There is the author of the romance novel. The one that the musical Sydnee and Zen are in is based on.”

“Ooh, sounds perfect!” Sydnee exclaimed. “Could you send me her information?”

“Couldn’t you get that yourself? Just talk to one of the directors of the musical. I’m sure they’ll have it,” Juliana pointed out.

“Yeah, don’t go giving Jaehee more work!” Moira chided.

“It’s not a big deal…” Jaehee started to say, but Sydnee was already shaking her head.

“Fine! I’ll get the information myself! No need to gang up on me,” she pouted.

“Now we just need a guest for Liana, to make things even!”

Jaehee thought for a bit again, and soon came up with another guest. “There is this group called the Cultured CItizens Association that has been meeting with Mr. Han for a little while now. I’m sure out of all of us, Juliana would have the easiest time getting them to come to the party.”

“Wow!” Moira beamed at Jaehee. “You’re amazing at thinking up all this stuff!”

Jaehee blushed slightly. “It’s nothing. I just saw someone from the Cultured Citizens this morning, and I keep up with the romance novelist’s works. So they were both on my mind.”

“Well, we have more guests for the party, so it’s perfect!” Sydnee said. “Wouldn’t you agree, Liana?”

“I’ll admit, I am glad that we are finally adding more guests to the list. That’s one less thing for me to worry about.”

Moira and Sydnee both rolled their eyes. Jaehee merely said, “I will send you the information so that you can get a hold of the Cultured Citizens, if that is okay with you?”

Juliana nodded. “That is fine.”

“Now enough talk about work!” Moira said. “After all, everyone’s busy, right? Let’s relax and talk about something fun!”

“I wasn’t the one who continued the party guest conversation,” Juliana said, throwing Sydnee a pointed look.

Sydnee just waved a hand in her direction. “Whatever, Moira’s right. We should talk about things that interest us, so that Jaehee can get to know us better! I’ll go first, of course.”

Juliana sighed, but no one interrupted Sydnee as she told them all about her new job. Jaehee seemed particularly excited to know more about it, saying that she would try to see it once the tickets were available. Despite not knowing much about Zen’s musical career, Sydnee and Jaehee drew Moira and Juliana into the conversation as well, catching them up on Zen’s acting from the past few years. The four of them were so engrossed in their conversation that it only stopped when Jaehee realized how much time had passed.

“Oh, I only meant to stay for half an hour!”

Moira glanced back at the clock on the wall. Not only had it been more than half an hour, but the break had almost reached the hour mark. 

Glancing at the clock herself, Juliana said, “I suppose I should get going as well.”

A pang of disappointment lanced through her chest, but Moira figured that Jaehee’s work would pile up the longer she stayed. Still, she couldn’t help but let out a big sigh as they all stood up.

“It was nice meeting you both, Sydnee and Juliana,” Jaehee said. “I hope that we can keep working together to make the party a success.”

“Of course!”

“Likewise.”

“Not only that, but we’ll become good friends as well!” Moira turned towards Jaehee and opened her arms. “A hug before you go, pleaseeeeeee?”

Jaehee hesitated for a moment, but leaned in to give Moira a quick hug. As she pulled back, she said, “Thank you for inviting me here, Moira. If I can find the time, I would like to do this again.”

“Yeah, definitely! Maybe next time you can meet Kazumi and Mi-na too!”

Jaehee smiled, then waved at them before she turned to head back to her office. Sydnee followed suit, leaving Moira and Juliana as the last ones at Temuki.

“Jaehee has really captured your interests, hasn’t she?” Juliana asked, eyebrows raised in her Moira’s direction.

Moira tried her best to frown at her as a blush crept over her face. “She’s just really fun to hang out with!”

“I’m sure.”

“A-anyway! At least Sydnee and I got both you and Jaehee away from work this time!” Moira flashed a triumphant smile in Juliana’s direction.

“Yeah, yeah, well now I shall go continue my work,” Juliana huffed.

“Ugh, so much for a vacation! C’mon, let’s watch a Kdrama together or something!” Before she could protest, Moira grabbed Juliana’s arm and started to drag her to the cafe door. There was no way she was going to let Juliana get away with working all day today. Not after talking with Jaehee left her in such a good mood!

“Hey! What about the guest emails?” Juliana protested.

“Last time I checked, emails don’t fly away!”

She and Juilana were going to do something fun. Then she’d be in just the mood to work on the bake sale for the party! Today really was going to be great!

✧✧✧

The day was already going poorly.

Not only was she exhausted as usual, but Kazumi’s art history test was the first thing to do that morning. She barely got through the class on three cups of coffee. 

Kazumi let out a sigh as she sank back into her bed. Her next class was only in a couple of hours, so she couldn’t pass out or she’d risk missing it. Yet she was also too tired to do any of her homework. So instead she scrolled through the recommended section of a social media feed, trying to stay awake by looking at some art.

A few things related to LOLOL popped up in between her normal recommendations, probably because she had been playing it recently. Seeing characters from the game drew her mind to Yoosung. Did he pass his organic chemistry test?

She closed her eyes, feeling her headache start to dissipate as her brain prepared for sleep. Then, snapping herself out of the slight reprieve, she tapped on the RFA app, hoping that Yoosung wasn’t in class. Maybe he could get on LOLOL and help keep her awake?

To her relief, Yoosung was at least online. In fact, he was in one of the chatrooms. Her friends would tease her later for being the one to ask Yoosung to play LOLOL instead of vice versa, but at the moment she couldn’t care less.

✧✧✧

She was probably overreacting. No, she was definitely overreacting. Mi-na groaned as she lay face-first on her pillow. Now Kazumi wouldn’t even want to talk to her. She shouldn’t have said anything. It’s not like Kazumi asked for her opinion.

Turning over to lie on her back, Mi-na started to run a hand through her hair. It hurt that Kazumi chose to spend time with Yoosung, someone she hasn’t known for that long, over her, but Kazumi probably didn’t mean anything by it. She just wanted to study, and Yoosung just happened to join her. Right?

With another groan, Mi-na flopped back onto her stomach. Just turning it over in her mind wasn’t going to fix anything. Reluctantly, she picked up her phone and prepared to re-enter the chatroom to apologize. But… it was closed. Kazumi and Yoosung had already left. Mi-na felt a stab of disappointment. Kazumi hadn’t even called or texted her. Did she even care that Mi-na got upset with her?

A ping drew her attention back to the chatrooms, which showed that Seven had opened a new one. Mi-na bit her lip. She really should call Kazumi to apologize, but… 

“I’ll just talk to Kazi later, when she’s less upset,” she mumbled to herself, only feeling a little guilty as she opened the chatroom.

Just then, a text came in from Kazumi herself.

Not a few seconds had passed after Mi-na had read the text before her phone was ringing, Kazumi showing up on the caller ID. She didn’t know what to do. Despite how silly it seemed, even to her, Mi-na was upset that Kazumi would not stop working to spend time with her friends. That combined with her embarrassment at getting upset in the chatroom stopped her from answering the call. 

The phone stopped ringing, then sounded again as another call came in. Eventually Mi-na worked up the courage to send a quick text that simply read, “I can’t talk to you right now.” She cringed at how short she sounded, but pushed the feeling down as she turned back to the chatroom to continue talking to Seven.

As she closed the RFA app, she checked her text messages to see if Kazumi had responded. There were no messages from her since the last one Mi-na sent, however. Mi-na furrowed her brow. She hoped that Kazumi just didn’t respond because she understood that Mi-na needed space, but what if it was because Kazumi was angry with her?

Mi-na shook her head and put her phone down. She could call Kazumi later when she felt better about it, and then they’d talk it out. It wasn’t as if Kazumi had the energy to hold a grudge anyway.

Making her way over to the desk, she opened up her computer and opened Discordance. A quick check of her friends list showed that Seven was already online, so she clicked on his profile and started up a call with him.

“Hey Seven!”

“Howdy Mi-na!”

Yeah, she’d just call Kazumi later. Right now she’d just enjoy playing a game with Seven!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, I'm back to uploading this. Next update will hopefully be sometime in February!


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